Medieval archaeology over the past thirty years has challenged the canonic history of the rise of Western Europe. First, the collapse of the Roman world in Italy by the 7th century was more profound than had been previously envisaged by historians, leaving rural society, in particular, maintaining comparatively primitive conditions. Secondly, in complete contrast, north-west Europe by stages between the 7th and 9th centuries developed an integrated economic union. Central to this was agricultural intensification coupled with strategic deployment of a silver currency. Thirdly, between the 9th and 12th centuries certain regions of Italy, drawing simultaneously upon connections to the north as well as the Mediterranean, became the economic and political motor of the new Medieval Europe, paving the way for the Renaissance. This project aims to make a paradigmatic shift in understanding the archaeology of resource management and commerce in the revival of the Medieval Mediterranean. The investigation will define how an inter-connected micro-territorial system occupying a classic riverine corridor in an area of Tuscany, first entered the west European post-Roman economic arena, and then, by steps over time, how these contributed to the emergence of major urban communes such as Pisa in 12th-century Tuscany. Drawing upon twenty-five years of multi-disciplinary research by different teams from the University of Siena, the new project, based in Siena, supported by a group of expert researchers, post-doc and PhD students, aims to examine these questions by undertaking a co-ordinated programme of research based upon survey archaeology, science-based archaeology, new archival research and environmental science. These data will provide a model for the integration of this region into the wider European economic union and the micro- and macro-political strategies involved.

The lacus Ligustinus was the great paleo-estuary of ancient Baetis or current Guadalquivir river (Southern Spain). It is a radically transformed landscape because of the intensive sedimentation and other geomorphological dynamics. The estuary banks were highly populated during the Roman period. Important cities and towns articulated the surrounding rural settlement, dedicated to the agricultural and livestock activities. In addition, the lacus allowed the connection with the maritime routes and the output of products destined to foreign markets. Nowadays this spatial configuration is difficult to restore, especially the exploitation villae settlement patterns. The main purpose of the project is to devise a methodology applicable to the study of the paleo-banks through the identification of archaeological sites. In that sense, the right border of the current Lower Guadalquivir region has been selected as a delimited study area, and particularly a local region of Cadiz province. The historical diachronic evolution will be analysed through the archaeological evidences. In order to achieve this, geomorphological, archaeological and other historical data from this area will be integrated in a GIS. Then survey methodology, such as geophysical survey, and UAV flights applications, will be applied in the local scale considering it as a continuum area, to detect archaeological sites employing non-invasive prospection techniques. We will apply this methodology through the selection of a series of study cases. The project will be carried out in the Laboratory of Landscape Archaeology & Remote Sensing (LAP&T) at University of Siena. This laboratory is specialised in survey and integral analysis of ancient landscapes. There the candidate will be trained in the application of these techniques in order to acquire skills for the interpretation of the collected data.

Microplastics represent an increasing threat to aquatic ecosystems, with potential impacts on the cycling of fundamental elements and ecological consequences at all trophic levels. Low-density polyolefins, like polyethylene and polypropylene, are the most common plastics produced and are ubiquitous in marine environments. Floating on the sea-surface, they can have direct and indirect impacts on the sea-surface microlayer (SML), a key interface for biochemical and photochemical processes controlling gas exchange between the ocean and the atmosphere. The SML is an enriched biofilm of organic biological material aggregating and favouring high microbial activity. The effects of an increasing presence of microplastics on the cycling of organic matter in the surface ocean are not well understood, and yet they may have a major impact on this key interface. POSEIDOMM will investigate the influence of microplastics on the photochemical and biological processes in the SML. We will verify the effect of microplastic pollutants on the formation of a surface-active biofilm, the implications for microbial cycles and for the photochemical generation of reactive chemical species and labile organic compounds. The goals of POSEIDOMM are to provide a chemical and biological characterization of the microplastic-biofilm aggregates in the SML, to quantify the photochemical cycling of such aggregates and to identify the implications of this cycling on gas exchange and on the microbial carbon cycle. This will be achieved through a trans-disciplinary approach combining innovative spectroscopic and biological analyses to study the SML in controlled microcosms and in-situ mesocosm studies. Through a close cooperation with leading European partners, POSEIDOMM will close major gaps in our understanding of the interaction of micropollutants with marine biological processes and atmospheric gas exchange.

With the extensive range of document generation devices nowadays, the establishment of computational techniques to find manipulation, detect illegal copies and link documents to their source are useful because (i) finding manipulation can help to detect fake news and manipulated documents; (ii) exposing illegal copies can avoid frauds and copyright violation; and (iii) indicating the owner of an illegal document can provide strong arguments to the prosecution of a suspect. Different machine learning techniques have been proposed in the scientific literature to act in these problems, but many of them are limited as: (i) there is a lack of methodology, which may require different experts to solve different problems; (ii) the limited range of known elements being considered for multi-class classification problems such as source attribution, which do not consider unknown classes in a real-world testing; and (iii) they don’t consider adversarial attacks from an experienced forger. In this research project, we propose to address these problems on two fronts: resilient characterization and classification. In the characterization front, we intend to use multi-analysis approaches. Proposed by the candidate in his Ph.D. research, it is a methodology to fuse/ensemble machine learning approaches by considering several investigative scenarios, creating robust classifiers that minimize the risk of attacks. Additionally, we aim at proposing the use of open-set classifiers, which are trained to avoid misclassification of classes not included in the classifier training. We envision solutions to several printed document forensics applications with this setup: source attribution, forgery of documents and illegal copies detection. All the approaches we aim at creating in this project will be done in partnership with a document authentication company, which will provide real-world datasets and new applications.

The ATTACK consortium will develop a new biotechnology based on harnessing a previously unknown natural cytotoxic mechanism of T cells to fight cancer. Cytotoxic T cells (CTL) protect us against intracellular pathogens and cancer by killing infected and cancerous cells. It has been believed that CTL operate on two different time scales of killing by releasing soluble cytotoxic proteins from dense core granules into the immunological synapse between the T cell and target cells (seconds/minutes) and by FasL-mediated apoptosis (hours/days). Members of the ATTACK consortium have independent observations that converge on a previously unknown weapon in the T cell tactical arsenal: stable supramolecular attack particles (SMAPs) that kill target cells (hours). This raises the possibility to engineer these particles to operate independent of T cells. Baldari has discovered that intraflagellar transport proteins sort cytotoxic proteins within the CTL. Rettig has revealed a new storage depot in CTL called a multicore granule that is distinct from the dense core granule. Dustin uncovered that CTL release SMAPs into the immunological synapse to kill targets. Valitutti has called attention to active resistance of tumour cells to synaptic attack, highlighting the strategic advantage of a non-synaptic attack. The consortium has expertise in mouse models, gene editing in primary T cells, super-resolution and live cell microscopy, and microfluidics. The goal of the ATTACK consortium will be to work closely together through 4 work-packages to determine 1) how SMAPs are made, 2) how they are released, 3) how they work and 4) how cancer cells respond. The consortium will integrate all it learns to develop the biotechnology of SMAP enhancement in engineered T cells, recombinant SMAPs, and synthetic SMAPs. We envision that SMAPs will be freeze-dried and shipped around the world, solving problems related to current immunotherapies, leading to global health impact.