An open data index to assess the green transition - A study on all Italian municipalities

This study introduces a municipality transition index based on open data and green transition principles. The Municipality Transition Index provides data and a succinct measurement of municipal attributes as defined by green policies at national and local level. We identify four dimensions of interest and 18 key performance indicators, defined at municipality level, and measure factors that directly and indirectly influence the green transition, with a focus on the Green Deal vision embraced by the European Union. The robustness and meaningfulness of the index is tested on a dataset covering all 7904 Italian municipalities. Our results show that computation of the MTI on this sample produces a bell-shaped distribution, suggesting strong geographic disparities and a significant difference between cities, towns and rural areas. The results show the need for policies and tools tailored at municipal level and provide information for practitioners, policy makers and experts from academia, useful for designing tools to underpin investment planning in the framework of the recent National Recovery and Resilience Plan issued by the Italian government. This may be particularly useful for enhancing green-transition-enabling factors that may differ across regions, helping policymakers to promote a smooth and fair transition by monitoring the performance of municipalities as they address the challenge

States of 15C via the (18O,16O) reaction

A study of the 15C states was pursued in 2008 at the Catania INFN-LNS laboratory by the 13C(18O,16O)15C reaction at 84 MeV incident energy. The 16O ejectiles were detected at forward angles by the MAGNEX magnetic spectrometer. Thanks to an innovative technique the ejectiles were identified without the need of time of flight measurements. Exploiting the large momentum acceptance (25%) and solid angle (50 msr) of the spectrometer, the 15C energy spectra were obtained with a quite relevant yield up to about 20 MeV excitation energy. The application of the powerful technique of the trajectory reconstruction did allow to get an energy resolution of about 250 keV FWHM, limited mainly by straggling effects. The spectra show several known low lying states up to about 7 MeV excitation energy as well as two unknown resonant structures at about 11.4 and 13.5 MeV. The strong excitation of these latter together with the measured width of about 2 MeV FWHM could indicate the presence of collective modes of excitation connected to the transfer of a correlated neutron pair

Preliminary study of the 19F(7Li,7Be)19O reaction at 52 MeV with MAGNEX

The 19F(7Li,7Be)19O charge-exchange reaction at 52 MeV incident energy has been performed at INFN-LNS in Catania using the MAGNEX spectrometer. The use of an algebraic ray-reconstruction technique has allowed to extract the 19O excitation energy spectrum and the experimental angular distributions obtained with a single angular setting of the spectrometer

How underground systems can contribute to meet the challenges of energy transition

The paper provides an overview of the several scientific and technical issues and challenges to be addressed for underground storage of carbon dioxide, hydrogen and mixtures of hydrogen and natural gas. The experience gained on underground energy systems and materials is complemented by new competences to adequately respond to the new needs raised by transition from fossil fuels to renewables. The experimental characterization and modeling of geological formations (including geochemical and microbiological issues), fluids and fluid-flow behavior and mutual interactions of all the systems components at the thermodynamic conditions typical of underground systems as well as the assessment and monitoring of safety conditions of surface facilities and infrastructures require a deeply integrated teamwork and fit-for-purpose laboratories to support theoretical research. The group dealing with large-scale underground energy storage systems of Politecnico di Torino has joined forces with the researchers of the Center for Sustainable Future Technologies of the Italian Institute of Technology, also based in Torino, to meet these new challenges of the energy transition era, and evidence of the ongoing investigations is provided in this paper

A Novel Role for Dbx1-Derived Cajal-Retzius Cells in Early Regionalization of the Cerebral Cortical Neuroepithelium

Patterning of the cerebral cortex during embryogenesis depends not only on passive diffusion of morphogens but also on signal delivery by Cajal-Retzius neurons that migrate over long distances

Impact of episiotomy on pelvic floor disorders and their influence on women's wellness after the sixth month postpartum: a retrospective study

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>The role of episiotomy as a protective factor against pelvic floor disorders postpartum has been debated for many years, but its routine use has been hitherto discouraged in the literature. Comparisons between restrictive and routine use of episiotomy in existent literature, however, fail to include any consideration relating to quality of life. The aim of this study, therefore, is to state the role of episiotomy in preserving the perineum from damage, in order to prevent the influence of pelvic floor disorders on women's psycho-physical wellness after the sixth month postpartum.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>A follow-up telephone interview was performed among 377 primiparous and secondiparous Caucasian women who had a child by spontaneous or operative vaginal delivery in 2006 using a self-created questionnaire and King's Health Questionnaire (KHQ).</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The mean age at delivery was 35.26 (±4.68) years and episiotomy was performed in 59.2% of women. Multivariate linear regression shows episiotomy associated to higher quality of life after the sixth month postpartum by correlating with inferior values of King's Health Questionnaire (p < 0.05).</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Episiotomy appears to be a protective factor for women's wellness. Women who had episiotomy and who experienced perineal symptoms have a better psycho-physical health status in the 12.79 months (±3.3) follow-up.</p