From Branches to Subsidiaries: Post-brexit Enforcement of Subsidiarisation in the European Union

in Böffel, Lukas; Schürger, Jonas (Eds.) Digitalisation, Sustainability, and the Banking and Capital Markets Union (2022)

A Public History of Monuments

in Studies on National Movements (2022), 10(1), 7-43

Value-Added Scores Show Limited Stability over Time in Primary School

in PLoS ONE (2022), 17(12), 0279255

Value-added (VA) models are used for accountability purposes and quantify the value a teacher or a school adds to their students’ achievement. If VA scores lack stability over time and vary across outcome ... [more ▼]

Value-added (VA) models are used for accountability purposes and quantify the value a teacher or a school adds to their students’ achievement. If VA scores lack stability over time and vary across outcome domains (e.g., mathematics and language learning), their use for high-stakes decision making is in question and could have detrimental real-life implications: teachers could lose their jobs, or a school might receive less funding. However, school-level stability over time and variation across domains have rarely been studied together. In the present study, we examined the stability of VA scores over time for mathematics and lan- guage learning, drawing on representative, large-scale, and longitudinal data from two cohorts of standardized achievement tests in Luxembourg (N = 7,016 students in 151 schools). We found that only 34–38% of the schools showed stable VA scores over time with moderate rank correlations of VA scores from 2017 to 2019 of r = .34 for mathematics and r = .37 for language learning. Although they showed insufficient stability over time for high-stakes decision making, school VA scores could be employed to identify teaching or school practices that are genuinely effective—especially in heterogeneous student populations. [less ▲]

A Review of Radio Frequency Based Localisation for Aerial and Ground Robots with 5G Future Perspectives

in Sensors (2022), 23(1), 188

Efficient localisation plays a vital role in many modern applications of Unmanned Ground Vehicles (UGV) and Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs), which contributes to improved control, safety, power economy ... [more ▼]

Efficient localisation plays a vital role in many modern applications of Unmanned Ground Vehicles (UGV) and Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs), which contributes to improved control, safety, power economy, etc. The ubiquitous 5G NR (New Radio) cellular network will provide new opportunities to enhance the localisation of UAVs and UGVs. In this paper, we review radio frequency (RF)-based approaches to localisation. We review the RF features that can be utilized for localisation and investigate the current methods suitable for Unmanned Vehicles under two general categories: range-based and fingerprinting. The existing state-of-the-art literature on RF-based localisation for both UAVs and UGVs is examined, and the envisioned 5G NR for localisation enhancement, and the future research direction are explored. [less ▲]

Quantum speed limits on operator flows and correlation functions

in Quantum (2022), 6

Covariant Riesz transform on differential forms for 1<p\leq2

E-print/Working paper (2022)

Banche e stabilità finanziaria: i criteri di idoneità per il top management

in Agenda Treccani (2022)

Task-Oriented Communication Design in Cyber-Physical Systems: A Survey on Theory and Applications

in IEEE Access (2022)

Communication system design has been traditionally guided by task-agnostic principles, which aim at efficiently transmitting as many correct bits as possible through a given channel. However, in the era ... [more ▼]

Communication system design has been traditionally guided by task-agnostic principles, which aim at efficiently transmitting as many correct bits as possible through a given channel. However, in the era of cyber-physical systems, the effectiveness of communications is not dictated simply by the bit rate, but most importantly by the efficient completion of the task in hand, e.g., controlling remotely a robot, automating a production line or collaboratively sensing through a drone swarm. In parallel, it is projected that by 2023, half of the worldwide network connections will be among machines rather than humans. In this context, it is crucial to establish a new paradigm for designing communication strategies for multi-agent cyber-physical systems. This is a daunting task, since it requires a combination of principles from information, communication, control theories and computer science in order to formalize a general framework for task-oriented communication designs. In this direction, this paper reviews and structures the relevant theoretical work across a wide range of scientific communities. Subsequently, it proposes a general conceptual framework for task-oriented communication design, along with its specializations according to targeted use cases. Furthermore, it provides a survey of relevant contributions in dominant applications, such as industrial internet of things, multi-unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) systems, autonomous vehicles, distributed learning systems, smart manufacturing plants, 5G and beyond self-organizing networks, and tactile internet. Finally, this paper also highlights the most important open research topics from both the theoretical framework and application points of view. [less ▲]

Elucidating the role of formate on cancer cell invasion

Doctoral thesis (2022)

Metabolic rewiring is essential to enable cancer onset and progression. One important metabolic pathway that is often hijacked by cancer cells is the one-carbon (1C) cycle, in which the third carbon of ... [more ▼]

Metabolic rewiring is essential to enable cancer onset and progression. One important metabolic pathway that is often hijacked by cancer cells is the one-carbon (1C) cycle, in which the third carbon of serine is oxidized to formate. It was previously shown that formate production in cancer cells often exceeds the anabolic demand, resulting in formate overflow. Furthermore, extracellular formate was described to promote the in vitro invasiveness of glioblastoma (GBM) cells. Nevertheless, the mechanism underlying the formate-induced invasion remains elusive. In this present study, we aimed to characterize formate-induced invasion in greater detail. At first, we studied the generalizability of formate-induced invasion in different GBM models as well as in different breast cancer models. We applied different in vitro assays, like the Boyden chamber assay to probe the impact of formate on different cancer cell lines. Then, we studied the in vivo relevance and the pro-invasive properties of formate in physiological models by using different ex vivo and in vivo models. Lastly, we investigated the mechanism underlying the formate-dependent pro-invasive phenotype. We applied a variety of different biochemical as well as cellular assays to investigate the underlying mechanism. In the present study, we underline that formate specifically promotes invasion and not migration in different cancer types. Furthermore, we now demonstrate that inhibition of formate overflow results in a decreased invasiveness of GBM cells ex vivo and in vivo. Using breast cancer models, we also obtain first evidence that formate does not only promote local cancer cell invasion but also metastasis formation in vivo, suggesting that locally increased formate concentrations within the tumour microenvironment promote cancer cell motility and dissemination. Mechanistically, we uncover a previously undescribed interplay where formate acts as a trigger to alter fatty acid metabolism, which in turn affects cancer cell invasiveness and metastatic potential via matrix metalloproteinase (MMP) release. Gaining a better mechanistic understanding of formate overflow, and how formate promotes invasion in cancer, may contribute to preventing cancer cell dissemination, one of the main reasons for cancer-related mortality. [less ▲]

« Préservons notre patrimoine numérique grâce au contre-archivage décentralisé et collaboratif »

Article for general public (2022)

TRIBUNE. Alors que le rachat de Twitter a mis au jour la fragilité des contenus uniquement numériques, l’historien Frédéric Clavert appelle, dans une tribune au « Monde », à créer des mécanismes citoyens ... [more ▼]

TRIBUNE. Alors que le rachat de Twitter a mis au jour la fragilité des contenus uniquement numériques, l’historien Frédéric Clavert appelle, dans une tribune au « Monde », à créer des mécanismes citoyens d’archivage pour « préserver l’information de notre époque ». [less ▲]