Numerical models of trench migration for lateral heterogeneous subducting plates

The aim of this Thesis is to investigate the effect of heterogeneities within the subducting plate on the dynamics of subduction. In particular, I study the motion of the trench for oceanic and continental subduction, first, separately, and, then, together in the same system to understand how they interact. The understanding of these features is fundamental to reconstruct the evolution of complex subduction zones, such as the Central Mediterranean. For this purpose, I developed 2D and 3D numerical models of oceanic and continental subduction where the rheological, geometrical and compositional properties of the plates are varied. In these models, the trench and the overriding plate move self-consistently as a function of the dynamics of the system. The effect of continental subduction on trench migration is largely investigated. Results from a parametric study showed that despite different rheological properties of the plates, all models with a uniform continental crust share the same kinematic behaviour: the trench starts to advance once the continent arrives at the subduction zone. Hence, the advancing mode in continental collision scenarios is at least partly driven by an intrinsic feature of the system. Moreover, the presence of a weak lower crust within the continental plate can lead to the occurrence of delamination. Indeed, by changing the viscosity of the lower crust, both delamination and slab detachment can occur. Delamination is favoured by a low viscosity value of the lower crust, because this makes the mechanical decoupling easier between crust and lithospheric mantle. These features are observed both in 2D and 3D models, but the numerical results of the 3D models also showed that the rheology of the continental crust has a very strong effect on the dynamics of the whole system, since it influences not only the continental part of plate but also the oceanic sides.

Lateral spreading and associated slope processes in fractured rock slabs

Landslides of the lateral spreading type, involving brittle geological units overlying ductile terrains, are a common occurrence in the sandstone and limestone plateaux of the northern Apennines of Italy. These instability phenomena can become particularly risky, when historical towns and cultural heritage sites built on the top of them are endangered. Neverthless, the mechanisms controlling the developing of related instabilities, i.e. toppling and rock falls, at the edges of rock plateaux are not fully understood yet. In addition, the groundwater flow path developing at the contact between the more permeable units, i.e. the jointed rock slab, and the relatively impermeable clay-rich units have not been already studied in details, even if they may play a role in this kind of instability processes, acting as eventual predisposing and/or triggering factors. Field survey, Terrestrial Laser Scanner and Close Range Photogrammetry techniques, laboratory tests on the involved materials, hydrogeological monitoring and modelling, displacements evaluation and stability analysis through continuum and discontinuum numerical codes have been performed on the San Leo case study, with the aim to bring further insights for the understanding and the assessment of the slope processes taking place in this geological context. The current research permitted to relate the aquifer behaviour of the rocky slab to slope instability processes. The aquifer hosted in the fractured slab leads to the development of perennial and ephemeral springs at the contact between the two units. The related piping erosion phenomena, together with slope processes in the clay-shales led to the progressive undermining of the slab. The cliff becomes progressively unstable due to undermining and undergoes large-scale landslides due to fall or topple.

Abusing data dominance in the digital market. The application of merger control and article 102 TFEU to data-related conducts.

The internet and digital technologies revolutionized the economy. Regulating the digital market has become a priority for the European Union. While promoting innovation and development, EU institutions must assure that the digital market maintains a competitive structure. Among the numerous elements characterizing the digital sector, users’ data are particularly important. Digital services are centered around personal data, the accumulation of which contributed to the centralization of market power in the hands of a few large providers. As a result, data-driven mergers and data-related abuses gained a central role for the purposes of EU antitrust enforcement. In light of these considerations, this work aims at assessing whether EU competition law is well-suited to address data-driven mergers and data-related abuses of dominance. These conducts are of crucial importance to the maintenance of competition in the digital sector, insofar as the accumulation of users’ data constitutes a fundamental competitive advantage. To begin with, part 1 addresses the specific features of the digital market and their impact on the definition of the relevant market and the assessment of dominance by antitrust authorities. Secondly, part 2 analyzes the EU’s case law on data-driven mergers to verify if merger control is well-suited to address these concentrations. Thirdly, part 3 discusses abuses of dominance in the phase of data collection and the legal frameworks applicable to these conducts. Fourthly, part 4 focuses on access to “essential” datasets and the indirect effects of anticompetitive conducts on rivals’ ability to access users’ information. Finally, Part 5 discusses differential pricing practices implemented online and based on personal data. As it will be assessed, the combination of an efficient competition law enforcement and the auspicial adoption of a specific regulation seems to be the best solution to face the challenges raised by “data-related dominance”.

Metamorphoses of Endymion and Selene: Dominance, Objectification, and Necrophilia

The aim of the research is to understand the transformations of the myth of Endymion and Selene from the Ancient World to the Contemporary Times with regard to the intersection of dominant femininity and objectified masculinity. The final goal is to show how these two macro-concepts have been represented according to a dialectical mechanism of cultural constants and variations of which the myth stands as a privileged plane of study. This connection will be explored in detail alongside with the eroticization of the sleeping and dead male body, to which its erotic agency is to be restored, by a woman who explicitly shows an erotic desire towards him. These two marginal desires are analysed from the point of view of the dialectic antagonistic to hegemony, and their expressive effects are examined in different media: literary, artistic, cinematographic. This relationship between the two lovers is marked by a significant presence of death that in the first part of the thesis is called female proto-necrophilia, while in the last part is named female necrophilia. The relationship that is in established between the two is a clear example of how anti-normative desires have undergone numerous attempts of neutralization and have increasingly become an expression of the medicalization of the uncanny. Female necrophilia is in fact the last step of a mythical romance that undermines the normative and hegemonic construction of ordinariness, but at the same time manifests its expressive and irrepressible power throughout the literature and arts of the Global North. To examine this in depth, the research is divided into five chapters.