Green Root Collective Action for Conservation of Agri-Bio Diversity: a Case Study in Tuscany

The literature on environmental policy shows that institutional arrangements are key in designing effective environmental policies. Besides regulation and market (Coasian) solutions, grass root collective action has been advocated as a possible solution for the provision of agro-environmental public goods. We gauge that the same institutional arrangement can be found in many territorially integrated food chains that aims at re-embedding food production in the local society. Building on this literature, we present a case study - a short supply chain for bread production from ancient local wheat landraces in Tuscany – emphasizing the role played by collective action in maintaining high quality production in a context of severe information asymmetries

Neutrinos from supernovae: experimental status and perspectives

I discuss the state of the art in the search for neutrinos from galactic stellar collapses and the future perspectives of this field. The implications for the neutrino physics of a high statistics supernova neutrino burst detection by the network of detectors operating around the world are also reviewed.Comment: 19 pages, 12 figures. Extended version of talk given at IInd International Workshop on Matter, Anti-Matter and Dark Matter, Trento (Italy), 29-30 October 2001. A reduced version will appear in Int. J. of Mod. Phys.

Dual-readout Calorimetry

The RD52 Project at CERN is a pure instrumentation experiment whose goal is to understand the fundamental limitations to hadronic energy resolution, and other aspects of energy measurement, in high energy calorimeters. We have found that dual-readout calorimetry provides heretofore unprecedented information event-by-event for energy resolution, linearity of response, ease and robustness of calibration, fidelity of data, and particle identification, including energy lost to binding energy in nuclear break-up. We believe that hadronic energy resolutions of {\sigma}/E $\approx$ 1 - 2% are within reach for dual-readout calorimeters, enabling for the first time comparable measurement preci- sions on electrons, photons, muons, and quarks (jets). We briefly describe our current progress and near-term future plans. Complete information on all aspects of our work is available at the RD52 website http://highenergy.phys.ttu.edu/dream/.Comment: 10 pages, 10 figures, Snowmass White pape

Commissioning of the MEG II tracker system

The MEG experiment at the Paul Scherrer Institut (PSI) represents the state of the art in the search for the charged Lepton Flavour Violating (cLFV) $\mu^+ \rightarrow e^+ \gamma$ decay. With the phase 1, MEG set the new world best upper limit on the \mbox{BR}(\mu^+ \rightarrow e^+ \gamma) < 4.2 \times 10^{-13} (90% C.L.). With the phase 2, MEG II, the experiment aims at reaching a sensitivity enhancement of about one order of magnitude compared to the previous MEG result. The new Cylindrical Drift CHamber (CDCH) is a key detector for MEG II. CDCH is a low-mass single volume detector with high granularity: 9 layers of 192 drift cells, few mm wide, defined by $\sim 12000$ wires in a stereo configuration for longitudinal hit localization. The filling gas mixture is Helium:Isobutane (90:10). The total radiation length is $1.5 \times 10^{-3}$ \mbox{X}_0, thus minimizing the Multiple Coulomb Scattering (MCS) contribution and allowing for a single-hit resolution $< 120$ $\mu$m and an angular and momentum resolutions of 6 mrad and 90 keV/c respectively. This article presents the CDCH commissioning activities at PSI after the wiring phase at INFN Lecce and the assembly phase at INFN Pisa. The endcaps preparation, HV tests and conditioning of the chamber are described, aiming at reaching the final stable working point. The integration into the MEG II experimental apparatus is described, in view of the first data taking with cosmic rays and $\mu^+$ beam during the 2018 and 2019 engineering runs. The first gas gain results are also shown. A full engineering run with all the upgraded detectors and the complete DAQ electronics is expected to start in 2020, followed by three years of physics data taking.Comment: 10 pages, 12 figures, 1 table, proceeding at INSTR'20 conference, accepted for publication in JINS

Single-hit resolution measurement with MEG II drift chamber prototypes

Drift chambers operated with helium-based gas mixtures represent a common solution for tracking charged particles keeping the material budget in the sensitive volume to a minimum. The drawback of this solution is the worsening of the spatial resolution due to primary ionisation fluctuations, which is a limiting factor for high granularity drift chambers like the MEG II tracker. We report on the measurements performed on three different prototypes of the MEG II drift chamber aimed at determining the achievable single-hit resolution. The prototypes were operated with helium/isobutane gas mixtures and exposed to cosmic rays, electron beams and radioactive sources. Direct measurements of the single hit resolution performed with an external tracker returned a value of 110 $\mu$m, consistent with the values obtained with indirect measurements performed with the other prototypes.Comment: 18 pages, 18 figure

The FDM readout system for the TES bolometers of the SWIPE instrument on the balloon-borne LSPE experiment

We present the design and first tests of a prototype readout for the SWIPE instrument onboard the LSPE balloon-borne experiment. LSPE aims at measuring the linear polarization of the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) at large angular scales, to find the imprint of inflation on the B-mode CMB polarization. The SWIPE instrument hosts two focal planes hosting 163 TES Au/Mo spiderweb bolometers each, cooled at 0.3 K for the detection of microwave frequencies of 140, 220 and 240 GHz. To read all the detectors, a 16 channel frequency domain multiplexing readout system has been devised, consisting of LC resonators composed of custom Nb superconducting inductors and commercial SMD capacitors. A set-up consisting of 14 LC resonators shows that we can accommodate 16 channels in the frequency range between 200 kHz and 1.6 MHz, since the necessary line-widths can be achieved. A preliminary firmware for the generation and read-out of the biasing frequency comb is also discussed

Limits on Neutrino Oscillations from the CHOOZ Experiment

We present new results based on the entire CHOOZ data sample. We find (at 90% confidence level) no evidence for neutrino oscillations in the anti_nue disappearance mode, for the parameter region given by approximately Delta m**2 > 7 x 10**-4 eV^2 for maximum mixing, and sin**2(2 theta) = 0.10 for large Delta m**2. Lower sensitivity results, based only on the comparison of the positron spectra from the two different-distance nuclear reactors, are also presented; these are independent of the absolute normalization of the anti_nue flux, the cross section, the number of target protons and the detector efficiencies.Comment: 19 pages, 11 figures, Latex fil

Search for neutrino oscillations on a long base-line at the CHOOZ nuclear power station

This final article about the CHOOZ experiment presents a complete description of the electron antineutrino source and detector, the calibration methods and stability checks, the event reconstruction procedures and the Monte Carlo simulation. The data analysis, systematic effects and the methods used to reach our conclusions are fully discussed. Some new remarks are presented on the deduction of the confidence limits and on the correct treatment of systematic errors.Comment: 41 pages, 59 figures, Latex file, accepted for publication by Eur.Phys.J.

Initial Results from the CHOOZ Long Baseline Reactor Neutrino Oscillation Experiment

Initial results are presented from CHOOZ, a long-baseline reactor-neutrino vacuum-oscillation experiment. Electron antineutrinos were detected by a liquid scintillation calorimeter located at a distance of about 1 km. The detector was constructed in a tunnel protected from cosmic rays by a 300 MWE rock overburden. This massive shielding strongly reduced potentially troublesome backgrounds due to cosmic-ray muons, leading to a background rate of about one event per day, more than an order of magnitude smaller than the observed neutrino signal. From the statistical agreement between detected and expected neutrino event rates, we find (at 90% confidence level) no evidence for neutrino oscillations in the electron antineutrino disappearance mode for the parameter region given approximately by deltam**2 > 0.9 10**(-3) eV**2 for maximum mixing and (sin(2 theta)**2) > 0.18 for large deltam**2.Comment: 13 pages, Latex, submitted to Physics Letters

History of discovery of the patagonian lizards

Knowledge of the history is necessary to understand why things are today as they are. Argentinean and Chilean Patagonia have a very interesting story about the native fauna and its discovery. The main character of this story is an adventurer spirit wanting to increase knowledge by traveling to the “end of the world”, ignoring barriers only to search and see what is beyond. Many well-known naturalists have visited this land eager and willing to find new species never seen before, while others have made some amazing contributions while never setting one foot on Patagonian soil. In this chapter, we intend to summarize how Patagonian herpetofauna was discovered, described and studied over time. In addition, we want to mention important scientists, whose work led the way for the future researchers to come.Fil: Williams, Jorge Daniel. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - La Plata; Argentina. Universidad Nacional de La Plata. Facultad de Ciencias Naturales y Museo. División Zoología de Vertebrados. Sección Herpetología; ArgentinaFil: Kass, Camila Alejandra. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - La Plata; Argentina. Universidad Nacional de La Plata. Facultad de Ciencias Naturales y Museo. División Zoología de Vertebrados. Sección Herpetología; ArgentinaFil: Avila, Luciano Javier. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Centro Nacional Patagónico. Instituto Patagónico para el Estudio de los Ecosistemas Continentales; Argentin