Sustainability and eco-labels in the tourism sector: legal framework and market evidence

This thesis aims to analyze the issue of sustainability, with particular attention to sustainable tourism and the various certifications that accommodation facilities can receive, following different sustainable criteria, which are voluntary and mandatory. In addition, this paper will explore the existence or otherwise of discrepancies between the theoretical framework dictated by ecolabeling practices and the actions undertaken daily by the main players in the world of tourism. This paper will be divided into three different chapters: FIRST CHAPTER: The first chapter deals with sustainable tourism. In fact, after an introductory paragraph devoted to presenting the broader concept of sustainability, the chapter will focus main lyon sustainable tourism, defined by the UN as "tourism that meets the needs of today's tourists and host regions while foreseeing and enhancing opportunities for the future". This type of tourism will be examined from its creation to its scale. SECOND CHAPTER: In the second chapter several themes will be addressed; in fact, we will analyze the issue of corporate environmental management, and certified sustainable brands, with a careful analysis of the sustainable and ecological labels that accommodation facilities can receive following various criteria. The labels mentioned in this chapter are EU Ecolabel; Luxury Eco Certification Standard; Eco Bio Tourism ICEA; Leg ambiente Turismo. THIRD CHAPTER: The last chapter will focus on a case study centered on an interview with Ciro Verrocchi, General Manager of Palazzo Fiuggi, a hotel belonging to the Forte Village group, and Manager of the Year in 2016, who will talk to us about sustainability in the hospitality sector, particularly in luxury hospitality. With him, I will also try to deepen what have been the consequences of the Covid-19 pandemic on the tourism sector and more specifically on sustainable tourism practices

Self-assembly of short DNA duplexes: from a coarse-grained model to experiments through a theoretical link

Short blunt-ended DNA duplexes comprising 6 to 20 base pairs self-assemble into polydisperse semi-flexible chains due to hydrophobic stacking interactions between terminal base pairs. Above a critical concentration, which depends on temperature and duplex length, such chains order into liquid crystal phases. Here, we investigate the self-assembly of such double-helical duplexes with a combined numerical and theoretical approach. We simulate the bulk system employing the coarse-grained DNA model recently proposed by Ouldridge et al. [ J. Chem. Phys. 134, 08501 (2011) ]. Then we evaluate the input quantities for the theoretical framework directly from the DNA model. The resulting parameter-free theoretical predictions provide an accurate description of the simulation results in the isotropic phase. In addition, the theoretical isotropic-nematic phase boundaries are in line with experimental findings, providing a route to estimate the stacking free energy.Comment: 13 pages, 10 figure

Black Hole entropy for two higher derivative theories of gravity

The dark energy issue is focusing the attention of an incresing number of physicists all over the world. Among the possible alternatives in order to explain what as been named the "Mystery of the Millennium" are the so-called Modified Theories of Gravity. A crucial test for such models is represented by the existence and (if this is the case) the properties of their black hole solutions. Nowadays, to our knowledge, only two non-trivial, spherically symmetric, solutions with vanishing cosmological constant are known by Barrow & Clifton (2005) and Deser, Sarioglu & Tekin (2008). Aim of the paper is to discuss some features of such solutions, with emphasis on their thermodynamic properties such as entropy and temperature, little progress being possible along the way which leads to a consistent definition of mass.Comment: 10 pages, 1 figur

Binge Eating Disorder and Body Uneasiness

Debate continues regarding the nosological status of binge eating disorder (BED) and the specific diagnostic criteria, including whether, like anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa, it should be characterized by body image disturbances in addition to abnormal eating behaviour. The aims of this article are: a) to concisely review the main points of the literature that has developed on diagnosis and treatment (especially pharmacological) of BED and b) to present the results of an original research on body image in obese patients with BED. The study was aimed to verify the following hypothesis: in persons with obesity, BED is associated with greater body uneasiness independently of some possible modulating factors. We studied a clinical sample of 159 (89 females and 70 males) adult obese patients who fulfilled DSM-IV-TR diagnostic criteria for BED matched to 159 non-BED obese patients for gender, ethnicity, BMI class, age, weight, stature, onset age of obesity, education level, and marital status. We used the Body Uneasiness Test (BUT), a valuable multidimensional tool for the clinical assessment of body uneasiness in subjects suffering from eating disorders and/or obesity. Obese patients with BED reported higher scores than non-BED patients in the General Severity Index (BUT-A GSI) and in every BUT-A subscale. All differences were statistically significant in both sexes. As expected women obtained higher scores than men. According to some other studies, our findings suggest that a negative body image should be included among diagnostic criteria for BED. Consequently, treatment should be focused not simply on eating behaviour and outcome studies should evaluate changes of body image as well

Smart City Digital Twin Framework for Real-Time Multi-Data Integration and Wide Public Distribution

Digital Twins are digital replica of real entities and are becoming fundamental tools to monitor and control the status of entities, predict their future evolutions, and simulate alternative scenarios to understand the impact of changes. Thanks to the large deployment of sensors, with the increasing information it is possible to build accurate reproductions of urban environments including structural data and real-time information. Such solutions help city councils and decision makers to face challenges in urban development and improve the citizen quality of life, by ana-lysing the actual conditions, evaluating in advance through simulations and what-if analysis the outcomes of infrastructural or political chang-es, or predicting the effects of humans and/or of natural events. Snap4City Smart City Digital Twin framework is capable to respond to the requirements identified in the literature and by the international forums. Differently from other solutions, the proposed architecture provides an integrated solution for data gathering, indexing, computing and information distribution offered by the Snap4City IoT platform, therefore realizing a continuously updated Digital Twin. 3D building models, road networks, IoT devices, WoT Entities, point of interests, routes, paths, etc., as well as results from data analytical processes for traffic density reconstruction, pollutant dispersion, predictions of any kind, what-if analysis, etc., are all integrated into an accessible web interface, to support the citizens participation in the city decision processes. What-If analysis to let the user performs simulations and observe possible outcomes. As case of study, the Digital Twin of the city of Florence (Italy) is presented. Snap4City platform, is released as open-source, and made available through GitHub and as docker compose

Small-angle neutron scattering and Molecular Dynamics structural study of gelling DNA nanostars

DNA oligomers with properly designed sequences self-assemble into well defined constructs. Here, we exploit this methodology to produce bulk quantities of tetravalent DNA nanostars (each one composed by 196 nucleotides) and to explore the structural signatures of their aggregation process. We report small-angle neutron scattering experiments focused on the evaluation of both the form factor and the temperature evolution of the scattered intensity at a nano star concentration where the system forms a tetravalent equilibrium gel. We also perform molecular dynamics simulations of one isolated tetramer to evaluate the form factor theoretically, without resorting to any approximate shape. The numerical form factor is found to be in very good agreement with the experimental one. Simulations predict an essentially temperature independent form factor, offering the possibility to extract the effective structure factor and its evolution during the equilibrium gelation.Comment: 9 pages, 5 figure

Pros and Cons of the SeHCAT Test in Bile Acid Diarrhea: A More Appropriate Use of an Old Nuclear Medicine Technique

Bile acid malabsorption (BAM) causing chronic diarrhea may be due to organic as well as functional disorders, and some of them were included under the general label of diarrheic-type irritable bowel syndrome (IBS-D). The 75-selenium homocholic acid taurine (SeHCAT) test is a nuclear medicine investigation considered to be the gold standard for the diagnosis of bile acid malabsorption (BAM). Many studies demonstrate that it could be effective in the clinical workout of chronic diarrhea due to different conditions. The SeHCAT test provides a quantitative assessment to estimate the severity of BAM and the possible response to therapy with bile acid sequestrants (BASs). However, there is no general agreement regarding its cutoff value and the test is not widely available. The aim of this review is to discuss the advantages and disadvantages of the SeHCAT test in clinical practice

Two-loop scalar diagrams from string theory

We show how to obtain correctly normalized expressions for the Feynman diagrams of $\Phi^3$ theory with an internal $U(N)$ symmetry group, starting from tachyon amplitudes of the open bosonic string, and suitably performing the zero--slope limit by giving an arbitrary mass $m$ to the tachyon. In particular we present explicit results for the two--loop amplitudes of $\Phi^3$ theory, in preparation for the more interesting case of the multiloop amplitudes of non--abelian gauge theories.Comment: 15 pages, plain Latex, 5 figures include

Exploiting the Combination of Displacement and Chemical Plating for a Tailored Electroless Deposition of Palladium Films on Copper

Various formulations for electroless deposition, to obtain continuous nanometre-sized and micrometre-sized films of palladium on copper, were compared. We deposited ultrathin films using displacement plating formulations. We obtained continuous films with an equivalent thickness between 6 and 22 nm, measured by exploiting the K-ratio method with SEM-EDS of Pd layers. The Pd films obtained in this step of the work represent a cost-effective catalytic substrate. As a second step, we selected chemical plating as the procedure to obtain palladium films with a thickness in the micrometre range. An ammonia-based Pd chemical plating bath represent one of the most effective chemical plating formulations. To prevent copper substrates from being damaged by ammonia, displacement plating with palladium was also applied as a pre-treatment to make the use of these plating baths a viable way to obtain thicker palladium coatings. Palladium films showing good adherence, compact morphology, and a thickness over 1.5 µm were obtained, proving that the combination of two different electroless techniques was the key to develop a sustainable procedure for micrometre-sized palladium coatings, which could substitute electroplating of Pd in galvanic industry for decorative applications