2,920 research outputs found
Sensor-based pavement diagnostic using acoustic signature for moduli estimation
AbstractThe diffusion of smart infrastructures for smart cities provides new opportunities for the improvement of both road infrastructure monitoring and maintenance management.Often pavement management is based on the periodic assessment of the elastic modulus of the bound layers (i.e., asphalt concrete layers) by means of traditional systems, such as Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) and Falling Weight Deflectometer (FWD). Even if these methods are reliable, well-known, and widespread, they are quite complex, expensive, and are not able to provide updated information about the evolving structural health condition of the road pavement. Hence, more advanced, effective, and economical monitoring systems can be used to solve the problems mentioned above.Consequently, the main objective of the study presented in this paper is to present and apply an innovative solution that can be used to make smarter the road pavement monitoring. In more detail, an innovative Non-Destructive Test (NDT)-based sensing unit was used to gather the vibro-acoustic signatures of road pavements with different deterioration levels (e.g. with and without fatigue cracks) of an urban road. Meaningful features were extracted from the aforementioned acoustic signature and the correlation with the elastic modulus defined using GPR and FWD data was investigated.Results show that some of the features have a good correlation with the elastic moduli of the road section under investigation. Consequently, the innovative solution could be used to evaluate the variability of elastic modulus of the asphalt concrete layers, and to monitor with continuity the deterioration of road pavements under the traffic loads
Nuclear Matter and Nuclear Dynamics
Highlights on the recent research activity, carried out by the Italian
Community involved in the "Nuclear Matter and Nuclear Dynamics" field, will be
presented.Comment: Proceedings of the 12th Conference on Problems in Theoretical Nuclear
Physics, to appear in Journal of Physics, Conference Serie
Video Laparoscopic Cholecystectomy : the last diagnostic step or the first Surgical procedure to prevent Cancer? A review of incidental Galbladder Cancer
CHANTI: a Fast and Efficient Charged Particle Veto Detector for the NA62 Experiment at CERN
The design, construction and test of a charged particle detector made of
scintillation counters read by Silicon Photomultipliers (SiPM) is described.
The detector, which operates in vacuum and is used as a veto counter in the
NA62 experiment at CERN, has a single channel time resolution of 1.14 ns, a
spatial resolution of ~2.5 mm and an efficiency very close to 1 for penetrating
charged particles
Characterization of prevalence and genetic subtypes of Blastocystis sp. in wild and domestic Suidae of central Italy aided by amplicon NGS
Blastocystis spp. is a common single-celled intestinal symbiont, comprising several genetic subtypes (ST) and trans-
missible by animal-to-animal, human-to-human, animal-to-human and, possibly, human-to-animal routes. This work
was designed to explore the presence of Blastocystis in sympatric domestic and wild suids and their ability to carry
zoonotic STs, in a condition of widespread opportunity to come in contact with the microorganism through their
shared water and food resources, and other carriers. We sampled 42 and 37 stool samples from wild boars and
domestic pigs, respectively. STs were first identified by PCR followed by Sanger sequencing. Sequences represented in
double-band PCR products or in Sanger chromatograms displaying multiple peaks, were resolved by next generation
sequencing (NGS). Twenty-six (61.9%) wild boar and 26 (70.2%) pig samples were PCR-positive, respectively. ST3,
ST5 and ST15 were found in 3.8%, 38.4% and 80.8% of the positive wild boars and 11.5%, 88.5%, 11.5% of the
positive pigs, respectively. ST1 was found only in pigs (3.8%). STs 5 and 15 were common in both groups of animals,
but in reversed proportions, suggesting preferential colonization. We found significantly different ST distributions
among wild boars and domestic pigs. This might indicate that lifestyle differences between the two populations
influence their risk for contracting certain subtypes, or that ST5 and ST15 can colonize preferentially wild or domestic
animals. Based on the STs described here, wild boars and domestic pigs can act as reservoirs with zoonotic potential.
The ability of suids to carry zoonotic STs appears to be higher when using NGS than Sanger sequencing, and resolution
of complex sequencing profiles is imperative before excluding the presence of STs of human concern
Integrated geophysical survey in a sinkhole-prone area: Microgravity, electrical resistivity tomographies, and seismic noise measurements to delimit its extension
Occurrence of Coxiella burnetii in goat and ewe unpasteurized cheeses: Screening and genotyping
Q fever is a zoonosis caused by Coxiella burnetii which infects humans as well as several animal species; sheep, goats and cattle are the primary animal reservoir. The main route of human exposure to Coxiella burnetii is inhalation of contaminated aerosols from excreta, especially birth products, while the role of unpasteurized dairy products in the transmission of Q fever to humans remains still controversial. The aim of this work was to evaluate the presence of Coxiella burnetii in unpasteurized cheese samples (n=84) by PCR and to genotype the circulating strains by Multispacer sequence typing (MST) analysis. Coxiella burnetii DNA was detected in 27/84 (32.14%) cheeses and positivity rate of handicraft cheeses reached 17.24%, while positivity rate of non-handicraft cheeses reached 65.38%. In addition, the MST profile of Coxiella burnetii detected in 5 cheese samples have shown the circulation of ST12 and ST32 genotypes in Tuscany
Isospin Dynamics in Peripheral Heavy Ion Collisions at Fermi Energies
We present a detailed study of isospin dynamics in peripheral collisions at
Fermi energies. We consider symmetric and mixed collisions of (124,112)Sn
isotopes at 35 and 50 AMeV to study the isospin transport between the different
reaction components (residues, gas and possibly intermediate mass fragments)
and, in particular, the charge equilibration in the mixed system. We evaluate
the effects of drift terms due to asymmetry and density gradients, which are
directly related to the poorly known value and slope of the symmetry energy
below saturation density. We verify the importance of an isoscalar momentum
dependence of the mean field, which is found to influence the isospin transport
since it changes the reaction times. We finally suggest two observables
particularly sensitive to the isovector part of the nuclear equation-of-state:
the correlation between isospin equilibration and kinetic energy loss for
binary events, and the isospin content of the produced mid-rapidity fragments
for neck fragmentation events.Comment: 34 pages, 15 figures, Nucl.Phys. A, in pres
Isospin Dynamics in Heavy Ion Collisions: EoS-sensitive Observables
Heavy Ion Collisions (HIC) represent a unique tool to probe the in-medium
nuclear interaction in regions away from saturation and at high nucleon
momenta. In this report we present a selection of reaction observables
particularly sensitive to the isovector part of the interaction, i.e. to the
symmetry term of the nuclear Equation of State (EoS) At low energies the
behavior of the symmetry energy around saturation influences dissipation and
fragment production mechanisms. Predictions are shown for deep-inelastic and
fragmentation collisions induced by neutron rich projectiles. Differential flow
measurements will also shed lights on the controversial neutron/proton
effective mass splitting in asymmetric matter. The high density symmetry term
can be derived from isospin effects on heavy ion reactions at relativistic
energies (few AGeV range), that can even allow a ``direct'' study of the
covariant structure of the isovector interaction in the hadron medium. Rather
sensitive observables are proposed from collective flows and from pion/kaon
production. The possibility of the transition to a mixed hadron-quark phase, at
high baryon and isospin density, is finally suggested. Some signatures could
come from an expected ``neutron trapping'' effect.Comment: 10 pages, 5 figures; espcrc1 style; IX Int.Conf. on Nucleus-Nucleus
Collisions, Rio de Janeiro Aug.2006; to appear in Nucl.Phys.
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