Meeting Patients Where They Are: Construction And Maintenance Of Analytic Intimacy.

This paper aims to describe the processes of construction and maintenance of analytic intimacy, understood as a shared state of relative internal freedom that is most permeable to preconscious and unconscious communications, which facilitate the processes of subjectivation, dreaming, and digestion of unprocessed trauma. The author illustrates the theoretical and technical features related to the concept of intimacy, highlighting the transformations of a clinical case followed in supervision. This article is presented in the form of a conversation with the supervisee, so as to evoke in the reader the dialogic and co-constructive experience of thought construction.

QM/Classical Modeling of Surface Enhanced Raman Scattering Based on Atomistic Electromagnetic Models.

We present quantum mechanics (QM)/frequency dependent fluctuating charge (QM/ωFQ) and fluctuating dipoles (QM/ωFQFµ) multiscale approaches to model surface-enhanced Raman scattering spectra of molecular systems adsorbed on plasmonic nanostructures. The methods are based on a QM/classical partitioning of the system, where the plasmonic substrate is treated by means of the atomistic electromagnetic models ωFQ and ωFQFµ, which are able to describe in a unique fashion and at the same level of accuracy the plasmonic properties of noble metal nanostructures and graphene-based materials. Such methods are based on classical physics, i.e. Drude conduction theory, classical electrodynamics, and atomistic polarizability to account for interband transitions, by also including an ad-hoc phenomenological correction to describe quantum tunneling. QM/ωFQ and QM/ωFQFµ are thus applied to selected test cases, for which computed results are compared with available experiments, showing the robustness and reliability of both approaches.

Assessing the quality of QM/MM approaches to describe vacuo-to-water solvatochromic shifts.

The performance of different quantum mechanics/molecular mechanics embedding models to compute vacuo-to-water solvatochromic shifts is investigated. In particular, both nonpolarizable and polarizable approaches are analyzed and computed results are compared to reference experimental data. We show that none of the approaches outperform the others and that errors strongly depend on the nature of the molecular transition to be described. Thus, we prove that the best choice of embedding model highly depends on the molecular system and that the use of a specific approach as a black box can lead to significant errors and, sometimes, totally wrong predictions.

Do We Really Need Quantum Mechanics to Describe Plasmonic Properties of Metal Nanostructures?

Optical properties of metal nanostructures are the basis of several scientific and technological applications. When the nanostructure characteristic size is of the order of few nm or less, it is generally accepted that only a description that explicitly describes electrons by quantum mechanics can reproduce faithfully its optical response. For example, the plasmon resonance shift upon shrinking the nanostructure size (red-shift for simple metals, blue-shift for d-metals such as gold and silver) is universally accepted to originate from the quantum nature of the system. Here we show instead that an atomistic approach based on classical physics, ωFQFµ (frequency dependent fluctuating charges and fluctuating dipoles), is able to reproduce all the typical "quantum" size effects, such as the sign and the magnitude of the plasmon shift, the progressive loss of the plasmon resonance for gold, the atomistically detailed features in the induced electron density, and the non local effects in the nanoparticle response. To support our findings, we compare the ωFQFµ results for Ag and Au with literature time-dependent DFT simulations, showing the capability of fully classical physics to reproduce these TDDFT results. Only electron tunneling between nanostructures emerges as a genuine quantum mechanical effect, that we had to include in the model by an ad hoc term.

In silico design of graphene plasmonic hot-spots.

We propose a route for the rational design of engineered graphene-based nanostructures, which feature enormously enhanced electric fields in their proximity. Geometrical arrangements are inspired by nanopatterns allowing single molecule detection on noble metal substrates, and are conceived to take into account experimental feasibility and ease in fabrication processes. The attention is especially focused on enhancement effects occurring close to edge defects and grain boundaries, which are usually present in graphene samples. There, very localized hot-spots are created, with enhancement factors comparable to noble metal substrates, thus potentially paving the way for single molecule detection from graphene-based substrates.

"Bringing the plague": Groundwork for a transformative outreach of psychoanalysis.

The authors lay the groundwork for a theory and technique of transformative outreach of psychoanalysis, a process of group building of a shared emotional experience by way of a discourse on issues of psychoanalytic relevance. The subject of interest is the public conference, where the "outreach session" is defined as a situation built on the basis of a well-defined setting, which allows the unfolding of the informative process to the best effect. Being able to grasp the quality of the experience that one is creating, while respecting individual differences, is a specific analytical capacity. To the audience, being able to feel that someone minds how it may experience being there, in that moment, means being able to experience in person the containing and transformative capacity of psychoanalysis. This frame of mind can be maintained much more easily if the speaker shows up without a written speech: "placing a sheet" between him or herself and the audience shields his or her perceptual-receptive capacity, which is necessary to give space to the waking dream activity. As theoretical background, the recent developments of the Bionian perspective proposed by Ogden and Ferro seem the most suitable to root our proposed ideas for good psychoanalytical outreach practices.

I play doh: The art of plasticine in the process of adolescent subjectivation.

Pre-adolescents' difficulty in portraying and communicating the internal turmoil to which puberty subjects them, both through the immaturity of their psychic functions and through the conflict between display and secrecy, presents a constant challenge to the analyst. A technical solution for making the process of subjectivation more pleasant may be found in modelling with Play Doh, a game/non-game which is not age-specific, an expressive form capable of evoking in the analytic field fantasies and representations that are otherwise only accessible with difficulty. This paper aims to present some reflections on the characteristic features of the Play Doh game in the session, with particular regard to work with patients between 10 and 14 years old who are in the midst of the process of adolescent subjectivation. The paper examines the clinical history of a young adopted boy who was able to develop the ability to dream his own experience and to portray internal experiences which had previously been unrepresentable.

[Psychological participation in cardiological rehabilitation: an experience of reduction of anxiety states through a psychological group of discussion]. / L'intervento dello psicologo nella riabilitazione cardiologica: un'esperienza di riduzione degli stati ansiosi tramite un gruppo psicologico di discussione.

The aim of this work was to evaluate the efficacy of a discussion group as a psychological instrument in the field of Cardiological Rehabilitation. This consisted in a one hour and half discussion, lead by a Psychologist with the presence of a nurse of the Service, during which the patients traduced in words the traumatic effects of the surgical operation. In particular, after this psychological intervention we found a reduction of the state anxiety as evaluated through the STAI-X1 Questionnaire, with a test-retest methodology, in a group of 43 patients of the Cardiological Rehabilitation Service of the Castelfranco Hospital in Emilia. These results demonstrate a significant reduction of anxiety, which was more evident in patients with higher initial levels of anxiety.