INQUINAMENTO INDOOR DA RADON. UNA APPLICAZIONE DELLE RETI BAYESIANE A SUPPORTO DELLA DIAGNOSI

Nel quadro più generale della tematica del controllo della qualità ambientale e più in particolare dell’Indoor Air Quality, la presente relazione riporta lo studio di un fenomeno di inquinamento da radon riguardante la scuola “G. Mancino” di Palermo. Lo spunto viene offerto dal fatto che nel 2005, nel corso di un monitoraggio della radioattività ambientale di Palermo, i tecnici dell’ARPA Sicilia hanno rilevato in questa scuola elementare degli anni ’30, livelli di radon indoor molto superiori ai limiti di legge fissati dal D.Lgs. 241/2000. Nella prima fase, dopo lo studio delle caratteristiche tipologiche e costruttive del plesso e l’acquisizione dei dati di misura pregressi, si è proceduto ad una nuova campagna di monitoraggio rivolta al rilievo di dati e misure sperimentali sulla presenza del radon indoor e dei dati meteoclimatici del contesto specifico. Nella seconda fase è stata formulata una proposta di intervento sostenuta dall’analisi dei meccanismi di inquinamento attraverso modelli di simulazione. In particolare l’approccio metodologico dello studio procede attraverso lo sviluppo di un modello di analisi basato sulle reti bayesiane, rilevatosi uno strumento utile di supporto per la diagnosi e le conseguenti decisioni progettuali, capace di controllare e descrivere fenomeni complessi e di stimare relazioni probabilistiche tra cause ed effetti

Health surveillance for former asbestos exposed worker: a specific programme developed in an Italian region

Asbestos-related diseases usually have a long latency since first exposure and this legitimates a health surveillance programme addressed to asbestos workers after the cessation of their occupational exposure. After a brief history of health surveillance initiatives performed in Italy as well as in other countries, we describe a regional programme for former asbestos-exposed workers, focusing on organizational features. A regional group of experts defined its operational and economical aspects. The Regional Council supported the whole programme, making it free of charge for all subjects who fulfil the predefined enrolment criteria (being resident in the region, being younger than 80 years old with cessation of occupational asbestos exposure within the last 30 years). The programme activities are classified in two levels: a first level for a basic health evaluation and a second level for in-depth analyses. In order to guarantee an homogeneous delivery in the whole region, the programme has to be performed by public health services with a quality control of activities. The involvement of specific public health services and the cooperation of social stakeholders are expected to play a major role in overcoming still open critical issues, such as the lack of programme existence awareness and adhesion, the correct stratification of subjects for the follow-up, and the real homogeneous delivery of the health surveillance in whole region

Sviluppo di tecniche di simulazione eterogenea funzionale e numerica applicate all’ingegneria di sistemi aeronautici

Questo studio illustra l’impiego del ‘Model Based Systems Engineering’ (MBSE), in cui strumenti di modellazione funzionale si integrano con modelli numerici, da tempo impiegati in progettazione, per la realizzazione di sistemi complessi. E’ analizzato un sistema antighiaccio aeronautico, sviluppato nell’ambito del progetto ‘CRYSTAL’. L’obiettivo è stato raggiunto collegando il gestore di requisiti IBM DOORS®, IBM RHAPSODY®, che opera in ambiente SysML, e SIMULINK® o DYMOLA®. L’interoperabilità è stata garantita dallo standard di connessione Functional Mock–up Interface (FMI), che ha permesso di validare il processo realizzando la cosiddetta ‘simulazione eterogenea’ di modelli funzionali e numerici integrati

Finite difference analysis and experimental validation of 3D photonic crystals for structural health monitoring

Copyright 2017 Society of Photo‑Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE). One print or electronic copy may be made for personal use only. Systematic reproduction and distribution, duplication of any material in this publication for a fee or for commercial purposes, and modification of the contents of the publication are prohibited

A modified RC-FDTD algorithm for plasmonics in Drude dispersive media

A widespread approach in the FDTD analysis of dispersive media is the Recursive Convolution (RC) method. In the Drude version it shows a not so good accuracy in describing the electromagnetic field at the plasmonic resonance frequencies. We propose here a modified RC algorithm which, by minimizing the time truncation error, guarantees a better accuracy of the solution at parity of memory requirements and number of time iterations. We test the modified RC algorithm proposed by analyzing the behavior of gold and silver noble metal nanospheres exposed to an optical plane wave with respect to the standard RC approach and the analytical solution

High resolution parallel FDTD simulation of plasmonic nanostructures

High performance computing (HPC) resources allow us to perform high resolution FDTD (Finite-Difference Time-Domain) simulations reaching a space discretization in the order of 0.1 nm for a 3D domain. A parallel message passing interface (MPI) FDTD in-house code has been run on an IBM BlueGene/Q supercomputer [1]. Three nanoantennas (nanosphere, dipole and bow-tie) of gold and silver have been studied. The dispersion modelling is based on the Drude equation with the two critical points correction [2]. The extinction, scattering and absorption coefficients have been calculated varying the mesh size. The classical staircasing approach is compared with a sub-cell one, where the material parameters are assigned for each electric field component of the Yee cell. The results show which discretization approach is better for each of the nanostructures and in which conditions round-off errors appear

Mappatura acustica del centro storico di Palermo

Gli Autori nell’ambito della collaborazione tra il Dipartimento di Rappresentazione dell’Università degli Studi di Palermo ed il laboratorio Agenti Fisici di Palermo dell’Arpa Sicilia, hanno completato la prima mappatura acustica del centro storico di Palermo. Il D.Lgs. 19 agosto 2005 n. 194 prevede, a cura delle Regioni e delle Province Autonome, l’elaborazione delle mappe acustiche strategiche degli agglomerati urbani la cui popolazione complessiva sia superiore a 100.000 abitanti e dalle stesse individuati con legge. Entro il 30 giugno 2007 avrebbero dovuto essere predisposte le mappe acustiche delle aree urbane con popolazione superiore a 250.000 abitanti mentre il termine previsto per quelle con dimensioni inferiori è fissato per il 30 giugno 2012. In questo lavoro vengono presentati i primi risultati relativi alle elaborazioni condotte in questi mesi, relativamente al traffico veicolare

Health surveillance for former asbestos exposed worker: a specific programme developed in an Italian region

Asbestos-related diseases usually have a long latency since first exposure and this legitimates a health surveillance programme addressed to asbestos workers after the cessation of their occupational exposure. After a brief history of health surveillance initiatives performed in Italy as well as in other countries, we describe a regional programme for former asbestos-exposed workers, focusing on organizational features. A regional group of experts defined its operational and economical aspects. The Regional Council supported the whole programme, making it free of charge for all subjects who fulfil the predefined enrolment criteria (being resident in the region, being younger than 80 years old with cessation of occupational asbestos exposure within the last 30 years). The programme activities are classified in two levels: a first level for a basic health evaluation and a second level for in-depth analyses. In order to guarantee an homogeneous delivery in the whole region, the programme has to be performed by public health services with a quality control of activities. The involvement of specific public health services and the cooperation of social stakeholders are expected to play a major role in overcoming still open critical issues, such as the lack of programme existence awareness and adhesion, the correct stratification of subjects for the follow-up, and the real homogeneous delivery of the health surveillance in whole region