This study aim at the valorization of wine industry by products; particularly on the extraction and characterization of grape seeds oil using supercritical CO2 (SC-CO2) and polyphenols from grape skins and defatted grape seeds using subcritical water (SW) and then, modeling of the kinetics of extractions and process economic analysis. The overall objective of the work is to develop recovery strategies for wine-making wastes in order to reduce their environmental impact and to valorize them in order to provide wine-makers with the possibility of selling by-products at a profitable price. To address the objectives, the work is divided into seven Chapters. In Chapter 1, some general overview and the fundamental of SC-CO2 and SW technologies along with emerging areas of applications are presented. Special emphasis is given to the work in the field of valorization of agro-industrial by-products. Then, the Chapter ends by stating the general and specific objectives of the thesis. The second Chapter is devoted to the characterization of grape seeds oil. To make the result more holistic, grape seeds from six grape cultivars were extracted using SC-CO2 in two subsequent harvesting years and the resulting oils were characterized. Comparative extractions were also performed by utilizing conventional solvent extraction using n-hexane and by mechanical press. The results testify the potentiality of grape seed oil as a source of unsaturated fatty acids and tocols. Moreover, they offers a clear picture of the similarities and differences among oils from different grape cultivars and obtained through different extraction techniques. The third Chapter is dedicated to compare the effectiveness of the models used to evaluate the kinetic of SC-CO2 extraction curves. Particularly, three models, the broken and intact cells (BIC), the shrinking core (SC), and the bridge (combined BIC-SC) models are critically analyzed. The objective of the Chapter is to objectively choose the best model that can be used in the subsequent Chapters. In order to model the kinetics of SC-CO2 extraction, one of the very important parameter is the solute solubility. But solubility data (especially of grape seed oil) is very scares in the literature. The bulk majority of the scientific works estimate the value of solubility of solute in SC-CO2 from theoretical models. So, the fourth Chapter is devoted to experimental determination of solubility of grape seed oil in SC-CO2 over a range of pressure and temperature of practical importance and the data were modeled by different models to compare their effectiveness. The fifth Chapter is aimed to study the effect of the main process variables affecting the SC-CO2 extraction of oil from grape seeds, both experimentally and through modeling. The dependency of the extraction kinetics on the variables more tested in the literature (pressure, temperature, particle size and solvent flow rate) was confirmed, and original trends were obtained for the less investigated variables, such as the bed porosity (ε), the extractor diameter to length ratio (D/L), the extractor free volume and the type of cultivars. In the sixth Chapter the attention is moved to the valorization of grape skins and defatted grape seeds by using SW. The results show that, both skins and defatted seeds contain significant concentration of polyphenols and SW is a potential green solvent for extracting valuable polyphenols from wine-making by-products. The extraction kinetics was also simulated by a simple model available in the literature. In the seventh and last Chapter, a preliminary economic feasibility study was investigated for the establishment of SC-CO2 extraction plant for the extraction of grape seeds oil. The result shows that, a SC-CO2 extraction plant is technically viable and economically feasible for the extraction of grape seed oil with estimated rate of return on investment at 8.5% and payback period of 5 year at current minimum retail selling price of grape seed oil in the market. The project has an attractive socio-economic and environmental benefit and generates substantial revenue for the local government in the form of tax and will allow wine-makers to sell wet grape marc at a price of up to US$ 10/ton.

Since the early 2000s, there has been a sharp increase in speculations that China’s development trajectory may provide a model for other developing countries—particularly those in Africa—to follow, and that this poses a profound challenge to the dominant global development paradigm. A highly-charged media and policy debate has increasingly made its way into the academic literature, with central questions focusing around the lessons that African and developing countries are drawing from China and around the desirability of such emulation. Due to the exploratory and recent nature of this growing literature, however, very few studies have been sufficiently grounded in empirical or theoretical analysis. This dissertation seeks to remedy this situation by examining the ideational influence of China’s development on those ultimately charged with evaluating and implementing these purported ‘models’: developing country elites. Drawing on the theories of cross-societal emulation (Westney 1987) and lesson-drawing (Rose 1991), it finds that elites in two countries cases—Ethiopia and Kenya-indeed seek to emulate countries in East Asia. China, however, is viewed as only one source of potential ‘lessons’, and its elites often embed its experiences within a wider East Asian development trajectory. In both country cases, this emulation challenges many of the assumptions that have driven development since the 1970s. Unlike the Washington Consensus, the development paradigm prompted by this lesson-drawing is historically-contingent and views nation-building by a strong, visionary political leadership as the country’s single most important priority. Because it favours large physical infrastructure projects, rapid economic growth, technologically-optimistic solutions and a civilisatory discourse, its divergence from the more recent ‘Augmented’ Washington Consensus is even more striking. In these and in other central lessons drawn, the development approach it most resembles, in fact, is the modernisation theory of the 1950s and 1960s. Despite the fact that both Kenya and Ethiopia thus possess modernising elites that seek to emulate aspects of the East Asian experience, different dynamics drive the process in each national context. In Ethiopia, a country slowly emerging from a history of communism and isolationism, a strong and ideologically unified ruling party looks to China, South Korea and other countries with a history of strong state intervention. In Kenya, by contrast, a coalition of business leaders, technocrats and planners view Singapore and Malaysia as potential models by virtue of a shared colonial history and divergent post-colonial path. Kenya’s vision, whilst more moderate, is also more constrained due to the relative lack of influence its modernisers wield in the political process. In both cases, historical factors bound and condition elites’ choice of model. The emerging literature on the ‘Chinese Model’ of development deserves credit for beginning to theoretically and empirically substantiate an important current policy debate, but it also vastly underestimates the importance of its predecessors. Given the extent to which Ethiopian and Kenyan elites root their emulation in the region as a whole, the East Asian ‘developmental state’ model is one such fore-runner. Most importantly, however, this emulation illustrates the enduring topicality of many of the assumptions of modernisation theory—assumptions that are likely to play a central role in informing African and even global development paradigms in the future.

The main argument of the dissertation is structured around the relationship of innovation and modularity with a special focus on innovation openness. This research took a grasp in understanding the context, the classics, story of Italian design, and Made in Italy at the same time exploring design today: based on a field work in Milan, Lombardy. Case study method proved to be as most suitable for answering the explorative nature of this research. The approach was thus relying on secondary data, desk research and observation for understanding the context both from the angle of tradition and current discourse, as for reaching the next level: collecting cases worth to pursue. The cases presented were chosen to elucidate the targeted questions, and to open the path for further research. However, obstacles faced on the field narrowed the cases covered, and the breadth of the investigation of each case study. Limitations in data access did not allow going beyond the story, I had to rely on what was constructed by the company itself. Despite these obstacles the analysis benefited from the perspective of communication and branding: it made possible to investigate a complex innovation effort. This proved to be a valuable insight, since design-driven industries are driven by producing meanings, forming the discourse where communication plays a key role. This work explores what modularity means in production opening up the perspective toward the aesthetic and semantic realm of production of goods. Furthermore in search for the locus of innovation it examines the relationship of modularity, innovation and openness. By exploring architectural innovation [Henderson and Clark 1990] I found that core design concepts that define the direction of technological improvements enter the conceptual frame of innovation: • What was interpreted as ‘values’ by the company defining the design are proven to be core design concepts in the conceptual frame, as they define here a technological and conceptual [stylistic] frame. • Thus, architecture draws here a semantic and aesthetic frame of conveying meanings. [Not just merely defining the technological construction of the artifact described by the interaction of the elements]. • Procedural innovation [coined by me]: the effort that evolves around the main objective to most efficiently elaborate on the core design concepts in technological, and semantic realms. Further findings of the case studies suggest that open methodology of design and innovation is prone to come from third parties to established firms: • open design methodology as a communication strategy that contributes to innovation practices of the company, and not as a conscious strategy coming from the other way round. Here technological and communication tools are intertwined, as they are conveying meanings defined by the core design concepts • Firms in need for raising their capacities and reshaping organizational routines to innovate turn to third parties in the Knowledge-Intensive Business Services • elucidate hybrid forms of innovation Adding to theory The above-mentioned empirical findings were backed by a concise summary on: • open/ user/ collaborative innovation scholarship • links between modularity and innovation • and understanding the relationship of modular design in the history of design and architecture; also elaborating the: • Semantic frame of innovation: where the product is an architecture of meanings • Framework for understanding stylistic realm of conveying meanings and innovation • Linking modular design of products as a conceptual approach [aesthetics] and linking it to production from an evolutionary perspective Adding empirical insights to be considered for • Organizational theory: namely redefining the boundaries of the firm • Innovation openness: based on the locus of innovation • Modularity: apart from focusing on production, organization and that modular construction of goods has also a conceptual meaning (conceptually exploring the relationship of modular design and integrality with examples from architecture and classics of Italian design). Considering goods as an architecture of meanings and firms producing brands rather than goods, it draws on the implications of arrangement of production.

‘Revisiting lesbians' and gay men's lives’ is a study on same-sex desiring individuals' changing life course in Italy from the mid 1990s to the early 2010s. Focused on sexual developmental trajectories, same-sex cohabiting couples, and parental desires, its main argument is that, even in a relatively short time period, Italian lesbians' and gay men's lives changed in ways that further sexual and relational pluralism and provide empowering narratives and resources to communities of sexually diverse individuals. Throughout the thesis, I adopt the framework of generational sexualities to observe transformations at the intersection of theorisations in the sociology of personal relationships, feminist research, and interactionism. Declining homophobia and unchanging gender sexual inequality result in lesbians and gay men reinventing the gendered aspects of sexual development and contesting homonegativity in familial, religious, and public milieux. In couple formation, sexual agreements, and emotional styles, lesbian and gay relationships are gendered, but the advancement of the relevance of prosaic and mythic love in the institution of coupledom helps same-sex partners negotiate interdependent lives and relational ties that are similar to contemporary Italian heterosexuals'. Despite facing the limits posed by gendered bodies and procreative and parental norms, lesbians, gay men, and same-sex couples see bio-social ties to the child as dependent on care-taking ties, and visualize and negotiate their procreative potentials and relationships aiming at securing familial happiness that is central in contemporary cultures of children's well-being. In the different aspects of lesbians' and gay men's life course, generational sexualities engage directly with contemporary Italian sexual citizenship, an exception in the Euro-American process of recognition of sexual diversity, and advance the pluralization of relational and gender norms. Chapter 1 discusses the theoretical underpinnings of the research. Chapter 2 presents the methodology and methods of the study, a qualitatively-driven mixed-methods research comprising gathering and analysis of biographical interviews with same-sex cohabiting partners in 2012-13, gathering and analysis of survey data on lesbian and gay lives in 2012-2013, and secondary analysis of survey data on lesbian and gay lives gathered in 1995-96. In Chapter 3, I analyse change in sexual developmental trajectories and strategies of resilience against homonegativity. Chapter 4 traces the emergence and institutionalisation of relational commitment in same-sex cohabiting couples. In Chapter 5, I look at lesbians' and gay men's parental desires as expressions of the changing social meaning of the child. Chapter 6 presents my concluding remarks, linking the generational agency and narratives emerging from new lesbians' and gay men's life courses to the prospects of Italian sexual citizenship and sexual minority communities.

Questa ricerca interdisciplinare prende atto delle visioni contrastanti all’interno della Media Literacy: da un lato quella utopica che individua nel progresso tecnologico l’alba di una nuova era per l’umanità, dall’altro l’approccio distopico preoccupato dalle potenziali derive conseguenti all’uso acritico e compulsivo dei dispositivi. Tale contrapposizione, sebbene con diverse sfumature, si riverbera nei vari ambiti educativi spesso impedendo la piena comprensione delle dinamiche della comunicazione contemporanea. La prospettiva antropocentrica che ispira l’intera trattazione valorizza i contributi non apodittici capaci di “dialogare”, passando dalla logica escludente dell’aut - aut a quella inclusiva dell’et - et. A partire da alcune significative acquisizioni delle Scienze Cognitive, delle Scienze Umane e dei Media Studies a cui sono dedicati i primi due capitoli, viene offerto un excursus nella literacy teso ad individuare piste pedagogiche praticabili nei diversi contesti, frutto della sperimentazione e della verifica sul campo riportate nella parte finale. Il lavoro intende dimostrare, non soltanto a livello empirico, che la Rete e la sua stessa orizzontalità possono e devono diventare paradigma operativo per un’azione educativa efficace in grado di superare visioni settoriali e semplificazioni, grazie ad un approccio multiprospettico incentrato sulla persona chiamata a “ri-conoscersi” per ripensare l’educazione nell’era digitale. / This interdisciplinary research notes the conflicting views within the Media Literacy: from one side the utopian one locating in technological progress the dawn of a new era for humanity and from the other the dystopian approach worried by potential drifts consequent to the uncritical and compulsive use of the devices. This conflict, although with different nuances, reverberates in the various educational environments often preventing the full understanding of the dynamics of contemporary communication. The anthropocentric perspective that inspires the whole discussion enhances non-dogmatic contributions able to "talk", passing from the exclusionary logic of the “aut – aut” to that inclusive “et – et”. Starting from some significant acquisitions of Cognitive Sciences, Human Sciences and Media Studies to which the first two chapters are dedicated, an excursus in literacy aimed at identifying educational tracks viable in different contexts, is offered as a result of experimentation and verification on field described in the final part. The work aims to demonstrate, not only empirically, that the Internet and its own horizontality can and should become operational paradigm for effective educational action able to overcome sectoral visions and simplifications, thanks to a multi-perspective approach centered on the person called to "re-cognize oneself" to rethink education in the digital age.

Una performance teatrale è un meccanismo complesso che viaggia attraverso molte variabili. L'approccio della lettura dell'evento performativo come nodo d'incontro e scambio di diversi agenti e aspetti è stato inoltre presentato dall'International Federation for Theater Research (IFTR) nella pubblicazione Theatrical Events. Borders, Dynamics, Frames. La tesi dottorale, in accordo con tale lettura, presenta tre case-study: Motus, Punchdrunk e Robert Wilson. I tre esempi sono qui analizzati nella loro totalità di opere d'arte, fenomeni culturali e meccanismi organizzativi, evidenziandone peculiarità, similitudini e differenze. Di ognuno sono stati valutati il processo creativo, le strategie di produzione, la relazione con la stampa e/o i mezzi di diffusione, le collaborazioni con la comunità artistica, la relazione con il pubblico. La ricerca è stata portata avanti coordinando diverse metodologie: la preferenza è stata data alle fonti primarie e al lavoro di campo nell'area di New York - interviste, fotografie, raccolta di dati e materiale iconografico. Sono stati poi consultati gli archivi della New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, della Byrd Hoffmann Foundation e del The Watermill Center. Il secondo capitolo si avvale inoltre della preziosa collaborazione sul campo dei ricercatori del gruppo ISPOCC (Initiative for the Study and Practice of Organized Creativity and Culture) della Columbia University Business School / A performance is a dynamic system that involves many variables. The importance of theatre performances as aesthetic-communicative encounters of a wide range of agents and aspects has also been stressed by IFTR, through the working group "Theatrical events" and its publication Theatrical Events. Borders, Dynamics, Frames. In accordance with the IFTR approach, the dissertation presents three case-study: Motus, Punchdrunk and Robert Wilson. The three international artists and companies are studied here as a crossroad of interactions among art, marketing, and social context, tracing similarities and differences in their theatrical productions. Specifically, the research analyzed four theatrical events: Sleep No More by Punchdrunk, Syrma Antigones project by Motus, The Discovery Watermill Day and The Old Woman by Robert Wilson. The essay is the result of a combined archive and fieldwork research based in New York. The archival materials is from New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, Byrd Hoffman Foundation, The Watermill Center, Motus theater company's archive, while the fieldwork collected visual materials such as pictures, sketches, videos as well as interviews and artists notes during the events. Part of the Sleep No More's fieldwork is in collaboration with ISPOCC (Initiative for the Study and Practice of Organized Creativity and Culture) at Columbia University Business School.

L’obiettivo di questo lavoro di ricerca è fare luce su alcuni dei motivi alla base di un rapporto tra scienza e media non sempre facile, nel tentativo di definire gli elementi fondamentali per un giornalismo biomedico divulgativo di qualità. In particolare l’analisi è rivolta al passaggio che più di tutti gli altri, nella costruzione della notizia, pone il giornalista e il metodo scientifico uno di fronte all’altro: la “traduzione” dell’articolo scientifico in articolo divulgativo. La valutazione di elementi quali l’approccio dei giornalisti alla significatività statistica e alla rilevanza clinica dei risultati di uno studio, l’utilizzo dei parametri statistici per esprimere gli esiti ha consentito di delineare una mappa dei punti di maggiore criticità del giornalismo biomedico. La “miscommunication” tra il mondo della ricerca e quello dei media può essere superata dall’acquisizione di un metodo che consenta al giornalista di individuare gli studi che hanno le caratteristiche per diventare notizie da divulgare. Questo lavoro è centrato sull’attività del giornalista, ma occorre ricordare come la comunicazione della salute sia un processo che dalla ricerca fino alla divulgazione pubblica delle notizie coinvolge diversi attori, ciascuno con il proprio ruolo e responsabilità ben precise. / The aim of this research is to investigate some of the reasons at the roots of the tension between science and media, trying to define some of the most important elements that could ensure the quality of biomedical lay journalism. In particular the attention is focused on the step that in the construction of the news puts the journalist and the scientific method one in front of the other: the “translation” of the scientific article in lay press article. From the analysis a picture emerges in which often the journalist is lacking an indispensable background knowledge needed to be able to recognize what is statistically significant or clinically relevant. The “miscommunication” theory, that both journalists and scientists consider an obstacle to scientific information, could be overcome by the acquisition of a method for medical journalists to recognize medical researches that can be used and moved into lay press articles. This research focuses on the correct role of journalist in divulging medical information. However, is important to underline the fact that many are the actors that partecipate to health communication and everyone has a specific role and than responsability.

La presente tesi è un contributo allo studio delle implicazioni economiche delle intenzioni di fecondità e all’analisi degli aspetti economici legati ai processi decisionali riproduttivi. Precisamente la tesi, composta da tre capitoli indipendenti e basata su dati Italiani, si focalizza su donne, su individui che vivono in coppia e sulle coppie. In particolare lo studio mira a comprendere: i) l'interazione esistente tra il mercato del lavoro (con un focus particolare sul ruolo del settore occupazionale femminile) e le preferenze per la formazione della famiglia; ii) le influenze della ripartizione dei ruoli domestici all’interno della coppia sulle intenzioni riproduttive; iii) le determinanti (all’interno delle coppie) dell’accordo/disaccordo circa l'intenzione di diventare genitori una seconda volta, e -per coppie che registrano un disaccordo- iv) le determinanti che spingono una donna a contrastare l’intenzione positive del suo partner per un secondo figlio. La tesi utilizza il mixed-method design, una strategia basata sull’analisi quantitativa dei dati nonché sull’analisi approfondita di interviste: questo approccio consente di studiare l'argomento da diverse prospettive e -grazie ai due metodi di ricerca -quantitativo e qualitativo- di approfondire le conoscenze del fenomeno di interesse. / The thesis is a contribution to the study of the economic implications of fertility intentions and desires and of the economic aspects of the fertility decision making process. Precisely, it is based on three autonomous chapters and it aims at understanding: a) for women and for individuals within the couples the interplay between fertility and labour market preferences (with a particular focus on the role of women's sector of employment), and the influences that the (un)balanced division of domestic duties play on the intentions of becoming parents for another time in Italy; b) for couples living together the determinants of their (dis)agreement about the intention of becoming parents again; and c) for couples that disagree on future fertility plans, the determinants of female’s contrasting attitude towards her partners’ positive fertility intention. The dissertation uses a mixed-method design- a strategy based on survey data analysis as well as in-depth interviews analysis: this approach allows investigating the topic from different perspectives, by means of both quantitative and qualitative research methods in order to provide new insights into the phenomenon of interest.

Nell’area oggi occupata dall’Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore di Milano a partire dal 1986 scavi di emergenza hanno messo in luce una porzione del suburbio occidentale di Mediolanum, e in particolare una realtà insediativa suburbana di età imperiale. Un’ampia area di tale insediamento è stata oggetto della presente ricerca che, combinando lo studio dei processi formativi del deposito archeologico e l’analisi quantitativa e statistica degli insiemi di reperti, ha permesso di ricostruire le trasformazioni che ne hanno preceduto e accompagnato la formazione e che ne hanno interessato l’organizzazione spaziale e la distribuzione delle aree di attività. In questo modo è stato possibile comprendere come nel tempo siano avvenuti cambiamenti nei caratteri e nelle finalità della frequentazione dell'area, che sembrano poter gettare nuova luce anche su fenomeni più generali che riguardano l’intero suburbio della città romana. / In the area today occupied by the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore di Milano, since 1986, rescue excavations have disclosed a part of Mediolanum’s western suburbium, and in particular an imperial age suburban settlement. A wide area of this settlement has been the object of this research which, combining the study of the formation processes of the archaeological record and the quantitative and statistical analysis of finds assemblages, allowed us to reconstruct the transformations which preceded its formation and those which concerned its spatial organization and activity areas distribution. In this way we have shown that the characteristics and nature of the settlement have considerably changed during the course of time, and these changes seem to shed light even on the general transformations which concern the entire suburbium of the Roman town.

La constatazione che in ambito sanitario il prodotto finale dei processi terapeutico-assistenziali, ovvero il miglioramento delle condizioni di salute dei cittadini, non possa essere definito soltanto in termini puramente economici e in un contesto in cui gli aspetti monetari costituiscono il perno intorno al quale si muovono tutte le strategie politiche, sociali ed economiche nazionali ed europee, costituisce il primum movens di questo progetto di ricerca. L’Azienda Sanitaria rappresenta, infatti, un locus in cui si embricano e sovrappongono le esigenze di numerose categorie di stakeholders (politici, fornitori, utenti e lavoratori) che, pur calati in un ambiente che possiede caratteristiche aziendali indissociabili da valutazioni finanziarie, non possono considerarsi esaurite nelle sole dimensioni economico-monetarie. Il valore finale dei processi di output di un’Azienda Sanitaria, sinteticamente riassumibile nel concetto di “soddisfacimento dei bisogni di salute della popolazione” riconosce, fra le componenti intrinseche del processo produttivo, cogenti sollecitazioni di carattere etico che presuppongono il rispetto di garanzie di equità, legittimità e imparzialità, irrinunciabili nella costruzione del prodotto finale. Questo lavoro di ricerca concentra, quindi, la propria attenzione sul processo di creazione di valore nell’Azienda Sanitaria, a partire dalle suggestioni bibliografiche inerenti le principali variabili economiche e organizzative, per giungere a indagare le corrispondenze derivanti dalle componenti intangibili. / The finding that the final product in the health-care therapeutic process, namely the improvement of citizens' health, can not only be defined in purely economic terms and in a context where the monetary aspects are the pivot around which move all the political strategies, social and economic national and European, it is the primary cause of this research project. The Health Service is, in fact, a locus where they overlap the needs of various categories of stakeholders (politicians, suppliers, users and workers) who, although dropped in an environment that has business features inseparable from financial ratings, were not exhausted only in the economic and monetary dimensions. The final value of the output processes of a company Health, succinctly summed up in the concept of "meeting the health needs of the population" recognizes, among the intrinsic components of the production process, mandatory stress ethical which require compliance with guarantees of fairness , legitimacy and impartiality, essential in the construction of the final product. This research focuses, therefore, its attention on the process of value creation in the Company Health, from bibliographical suggestions regarding the main economic and organizational variables, to come to investigate the matches resulting from intangible assets.