Essays on Public Investments in Green Projects and Development Paradigm of Economic Growth and Environmental Sustainability

This doctoral thesis is a collection of three empirical essays that develops an analytical framework to assess the impacts of demand-driven recovery investments, in local, regional, and multi-regional economies in equilibrium. These recovery investments are part of a broader regional fiscal spending on many projects, including investment in urban development, environmental quality, industrial sites’ rehabilitation, ports, healthcare, social inclusion and education, government systems, and var...

Gestural Interaction in Extended Reality

This thesis focuses on gesture-based interaction, an important topic of Human-Computer Interaction, within the context of extended reality environments. Recent advancements in sensing technologies, computational power, and extended reality platforms have significantly increased the % added the interest in gesture recognition research. Despite this progress, several challenges remain, including the continuous and accurate detection of gestures and the development of systems capable of real-ti...

Detecting Propaganda in Ukraine-Russia War Tweets by Politicians: A CACDA and Computational Perspective

Social media platforms have emerged as critical tools for political communication, particularly during conflicts where information is weaponized to shape public opinion and influence political realities. The Ukraine-Russia war exemplifies this phenomenon, with Twitter (now X) functioning as a digital battlefield. On this platform, political actors employ propaganda to (de)legitimize ideologies and assert power dynamics, thereby shaping socio-political narratives. This study conceptualizes and...

Estudio pragmático del componente temporal en los adverbios aproximativos. El caso de "aún" y "todavía"

Multifunctional doped ferrite nanoparticles for cancer therapy: innovations in magnetic fluid hyperthermia and imaging technologies

This PhD thesis investigates the development and application of multifunctional magnetic nanoparticles (MNPs) to advance cancer therapy, particularly through the integration of magnetic fluid hyperthermia (MFH) with diagnostic imaging techniques such as magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and magnetic particle imaging (MPI). This work addresses some critical challenges in hyperthermia-based cancer treatment by introducing a novel class of doped ferrite nanoparticles engineered with self-regulati...

Development of novel lanthanide-doped Nanomaterials for biomedical application

BECOMING A REFLECTIVE PRACTITIONER: A CASE STUDY OF CHINESE LANGUAGE TEACHERS’ PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT IN A COOPERATIVE LEARNING CONTEXT

Reflective practice (henceforth RP) has increasingly become embedded within discourse concerning teachers’ professional development in recent years. Yet RP enjoys little popularity in the research of Chinese language learning and teaching. This study aims to explore the current understanding of reflective practice among a purposeful group of in-service Chinese language teachers and its impact on their professional development in a cooperative context in Italian high schools. The objectives of...

Development of novel lanthanide-doped Nanomaterials for biomedical application

The research on nanomaterials for biomedical and technological applications is nowadays particularly flourishing thanks to the multiple interesting properties deriving from the small size of the nanoparticles. Particularly interesting are lanthanide-doped nanomaterials with peculiar luminescent properties that could be applied in several technological fields, such as energy, security and bioremediation. In the biomedical field, they could be exploited as optical imaging contrast agents, thera...

Auxiliary selection in Italian and French. A comparative study of the so-called peripheral verbs.

This thesis investigates the intricate phenomenon of auxiliary selection in two Romance languages, namely Italian and French. The primary objective is to elucidate the factors that influence the choice between the auxiliaries ‘be’ and ‘have’ in the formation of the perfect tense. The study focuses on verbs that can select both auxiliaries, commonly known as peripheral verbs (Sorace 2000), which, despite extensive individual examination, have not been comprehensively analyzed (Giancarli 2015)....