324 research outputs found
Radioactive Needlework, Reconstruction of needle-positions in radiation treatment
Nucletron presented a medical problem to the SWI 2006: how to find needles used for cancer treatment in a prostate? More concretely: how to find the positions of these needles from distorted images from an ultrasound probe? Section 1 explains the background of this problem. In Section 2 we deal with physical explanations for the distortions. In Section 3 we give a brief overview of medical imaging and explain which techniques we used to clean up the images
Antioxidant Compounds, Mineral Content and Antioxidant Activity of Several Tomato Cultivars Grown in Southwestern Romania
Ten indeterminate tomato cultivars differing in fruit shape and typology, grown simultaneously in a greenhouse from Oltenia (Southwestern Romania) and harvested at red ripe stage, were investigated for the contents in ascorbic acid, lycopene, β-carotene, total phenolics, minerals (K, Na, Ca and Mg) and trace elements (Fe, Cu, Mn, Cr, Zn and B). In addition, their antioxidant activities were determined. Significant differences were found among tomato cultivars in all studied antioxidant compounds, as well as in the antioxidant activity. Ascorbic acid ranged from 91.9 to 329.7 mg kg-1 fw, lycopene ranged from 19.7 to 49.0 mg kg-1 fw, while total phenolic compounds varied between 300.2 and 557.8 mg kg-1 fw. Antioxidant activity ranged from 0.81 mmol Trolox kg-1 fw to 1.74 mmol Trolox kg-1 fw and it was significantly correlated to total phenolics content (r = 0.91; p< 0.05). The cocktail type cultivar ‘Tiger’ and the cherry type cultivar ‘Belle’ proved to be the most powerful in antioxidant activity and phenolic compounds while the rectangular plum shaped cultivar ‘Porto’ recorded the highest average lycopene content. A valuable cultivar proved to be the brownish red ‘Sacher’ which registered among the highest contents of phenolics, lycopene and ascorbic acid. Mineral and trace elements contents were also significantly affected by cultivars. Values recorded for K, Ca and Mg ranged from 2139.6 to 3056.9 mg kg-1, 137.7 to 325.8 mg kg-1 and 27.3 to 168.7 mg kg-1 respectively
Misleading graphs in context:Less misleading than expected
Misleading graphs are a source of misinformation that worry many experts. Especially people with a low graph literacy are thought to be persuaded by graphs that misrepresent the underlying data. But we know little about how people interpret misleading graphs and how these graphs influence their opinions. In this study we focus on the effect of truncating the y-axis for a line chart which exaggerates an upgoing trend. In a randomized controlled trial, we showed participants either a normal or a misleading chart, and we did so in two different contexts. After they had seen the graphs, we asked participants their opinion on the trend and to give an estimation of the increase. Finally we measured their graph literacy. Our results show that context is the only significant factor in opinion-forming; the misleading graph and graph literacy had no effect. None of these factors had a significant impact on estimations for the increase. These results show that people might be less susceptible to misleading graphs than we thought and that context has more impact than a misleading y-axis.Science Communication and Societ
SiPM and front-end electronics development for Cherenkov light detection
The Italian Institute of Nuclear Physics (INFN) is involved in the
development of a demonstrator for a SiPM-based camera for the Cherenkov
Telescope Array (CTA) experiment, with a pixel size of 66 mm. The
camera houses about two thousands electronics channels and is both light and
compact. In this framework, a R&D program for the development of SiPMs suitable
for Cherenkov light detection (so called NUV SiPMs) is ongoing. Different
photosensors have been produced at Fondazione Bruno Kessler (FBK), with
different micro-cell dimensions and fill factors, in different geometrical
arrangements. At the same time, INFN is developing front-end electronics based
on the waveform sampling technique optimized for the new NUV SiPM. Measurements
on 11 mm, 33 mm, and 66 mm NUV SiPMs
coupled to the front-end electronics are presentedComment: In Proceedings of the 34th International Cosmic Ray Conference
(ICRC2015), The Hague, The Netherlands. All CTA contributions at
arXiv:1508.0589
Silicon Photomultipliers and front-end electronics performance for Cherenkov Telescope Array camera development
Atmospheric production of energetic protons, electrons and positrons observed in near Earth orbit
Abstract Substantial fluxes of protons and leptons with energies below the geomagnetic cutoff have been measured by the AMS experiment at altitudes of 350–390 km, in the latitude interval ±51.7°. The production mechanisms of the observed trapped fluxes are investigated in detail by means of the FLUKA Monte Carlo simulation code. All known processes involved in the interaction of the cosmic rays with the atmosphere (detailed descriptions of the magnetic field and the atmospheric density, as well as the electromagnetic and nuclear interaction processes) are included in the simulation. The results are presented and compared with experimental data, indicating good agreement with the observed fluxes. The impact of the secondary proton flux on particle production in atmosphere is briefly discussed
Measurements and tests on FBK silicon sensors with an optimized electronic design for a CTA camera
In October 2013, the Italian Ministry approved the funding of a Research &
Development (R&D) study, within the "Progetto Premiale TElescopi CHErenkov made
in Italy (TECHE)", devoted to the development of a demonstrator for a camera
for the Cherenkov Telescope Array (CTA) consortium. The demonstrator consists
of a sensor plane based on the Silicon Photomultiplier (SiPM) technology and on
an electronics designed for signal sampling. Preliminary tests on a matrix of
sensors produced by the Fondazione Bruno Kessler (FBK-Trento, Italy) and on
electronic prototypes produced by SITAEL S.p.A. will be presented. In
particular, we used different designs of the electronics in order to optimize
the output signals in terms of tail cancellation. This is crucial for
applications where a high background is expected, as for the CTA experiment.Comment: 5 pages, 6 figures; Proceedings of the 10th Workshop on Science with
the New Generation of High-Energy Gamma-ray experiments (SciNeGHE) -
PoS(Scineghe2014)00
The internal alignment and position resolution of the AMS-02 silicon tracker determined with cosmic-ray muons
Abstract The Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer is a large acceptance cosmic-ray detector ( 0.5 m 2 sr ) designed to operate at an altitude of 400 km on the International Space Station. The AMS-02 silicon tracker contains 2264 silicon microstrip sensors (total active area 6.75 m 2 ). The internal alignment parameters of the assembled tracker have been determined on the ground with cosmic-ray muons. The alignment procedure is described and results for the alignment precision and position resolution are reported
Characterization and possible astrophysics applications of UV sensitive SiPM devices
The National Institute of Nuclear Physics (INFN) is involved in the R&D of Silicon Photomultiplier (SiPM) sensors optimized to detect near-UV (NUV) photon radiation in low-intensity photons and high-precision time mesaurements, in collaboration with the Bruno Kessler Foundation (FBK). The performances of 6×6 mm2 NUV-HD SiPMs with 30×30 μm2 microcell area and the possible prospects for production and packaging of multi-sensor modules for astrophysical applications are discussed in this paper
INFN Camera demonstrator for the Cherenkov Telescope Array
The Cherenkov Telescope Array is a world-wide project for a new generation of
ground-based Cherenkov telescopes of the Imaging class with the aim of
exploring the highest energy region of the electromagnetic spectrum. With two
planned arrays, one for each hemisphere, it will guarantee a good sky coverage
in the energy range from a few tens of GeV to hundreds of TeV, with improved
angular resolution and a sensitivity in the TeV energy region better by one
order of magnitude than the currently operating arrays. In order to cover this
wide energy range, three different telescope types are envisaged, with
different mirror sizes and focal plane features. In particular, for the highest
energies a possible design is a dual-mirror Schwarzschild-Couder optical
scheme, with a compact focal plane. A silicon photomultiplier (SiPM) based
camera is being proposed as a solution to match the dimensions of the pixel
(angular size of ~ 0.17 degrees). INFN is developing a camera demonstrator made
by 9 Photo Sensor Modules (PSMs, 64 pixels each, with total coverage 1/4 of the
focal plane) equipped with FBK (Fondazione Bruno Kessler, Italy) Near
UltraViolet High Fill factor SiPMs and Front-End Electronics (FEE) based on a
Target 7 ASIC, a 16 channels fast sampler (up to 2GS/s) with deep buffer,
self-trigger and on-demand digitization capabilities specifically developed for
this purpose. The pixel dimensions of mm lead to a very compact
design with challenging problems of thermal dissipation. A modular structure,
made by copper frames hosting one PSM and the corresponding FEE, has been
conceived, with a water cooling system to keep the required working
temperature. The actual design, the adopted technical solutions and the
achieved results for this demonstrator are presented and discussed.Comment: In Proceedings of the 34th International Cosmic Ray Conference
(ICRC2015), The Hague, The Netherlands. All CTA contributions at
arXiv:1508.0589
- …