Knowledge and valorization of historical sites through 3D documentation and modeling

The paper presents the first results of an interdisciplinary project related to the 3D documentation, dissemination, valorization and digital access of archeological sites. Beside the mere 3D documentation aim, the project has two goals: (i) to easily explore and share via web references and results of the interdisciplinary work, including the interpretative process and the final reconstruction of the remains; (ii) to promote and valorize archaeological areas using reality-based 3D data and Virtual Reality devices. This method has been verified on the ruins of the archeological site of Pausilypon, a maritime villa of Roman period (Naples, Italy). Using Unity3D, the virtual tour of the heritage site was integrated and enriched with the surveyed 3D data, text documents, CAAD reconstruction hypotheses, drawings, photos, etc. In this way, starting from the actual appearance of the ruins (panoramic images), passing through the 3D digital surveying models and several other historical information, the user is able to access virtual contents and reconstructed scenarios, all in a single virtual, interactive and immersive environment. These contents and scenarios allow to derive documentation and geometrical information, understand the site, perform analyses, see interpretative processes, communicate historical information and valorize the heritage location

The difficult alliance between vegan parents and pediatrician: A case report

The number of children on a vegetarian or vegan diet is gradually increasing. If not balanced and adequately supplemented, these dietary regimes can seriously impact the growth of children. Often the pediatrician is not perceived as a figure to rely on in the event of parents’ willingness to follow an alternative diet for their child. The feeling of distrust of parents towards the pediatrician can be dangerous for the health of the child. We present a 22-month-old boy with failure to thrive probably induced by an unbalanced vegetarian diet. The acquisition of the anamnestic data concerning the child’s diet was difficult because initially omitted by the parents. The poor compliance and the difficult follow-up highlights the difficulty in establishing a therapeutic alliance between parents who follow alternative regimens and the pediatrician

Geometric feature analysis for the classification of cultural heritage point clouds

In the last years, the application of artificial intelligence (Machine Learning and Deep Learning methods) for the classification of 3D point clouds has become an important task in modern 3D documentation and modelling applications. The identification of proper geometric and radiometric features becomes fundamental to classify 2D/3D data correctly. While many studies have been conducted in the geospatial field, the cultural heritage sector is still partly unexplored. In this paper we analyse the efficacy of the geometric covariance features as a support for the classification of Cultural Heritage point clouds. To analyse the impact of the different features calculated on spherical neighbourhoods at various radius sizes, we present results obtained on four different heritage case studies using different features configurations

Bloodied Hearts and Bawdy Planets: Greco-Roman Astrology and the Regenerative Force of the Feminine in Shakespeare’s \u3ci\u3eThe Winter’s Tale\u3c/i\u3e

This thesis offers a new reading of William Shakespeare’s late play The Winter’s Tale (1623), positing that in order to understand this complex and eccentric work, we must read it with a complex and eccentric eye. In The Winter’s Tale, planets strike without warning, pulling at hearts, wombs, and blood, impacting the health and emotional experience of characters in the play. This work is renowned for its inconsistent formal structure; the first half is a tragedy set in winter, but abruptly shifts to a comedy set in spring/summer in its latter half. What’s more, is that planets, luminaries, and stars above constantly interfere with human life, due to their gravitational pull. I argue that in order to fully comprehend The Winter’s Tale and all its nuance, one must read it with an understanding of Renaissance astrology, a science that was fully embedded in Shakespeare’s cultural milieu. The astrological worldview accepts that the motion of planets in the heavens impact life on earth, and this is crystallized in the Renaissance belief of micro- and macrocosmic interplay. By tracing planetary language in The Winter’s Tale, we find a deeper reading of the play\u27s gender dynamics than previous scholarship has offered. The Winter\u27s Tale\u27s central focus is Leontes, king of Sicilia, who believes his wife has committed adultery. This launches him into unwarranted fits of misogynistic destruction, inadvertently instigating the seeming death of his family and other tragic events. Shakespeare drew richly, in all of his works, from Greco-Roman myth, Greek drama, and history, and embedded in all of those disciplines is the biopolitics of the polis. Classical Athenian culture purposefully limited the rights of women, who were thought to lack emotional control, in comparison to men. The Renaissance was a moment of cultural rebirth, heavily influenced by classical Greek cultural materials, of which astrology was much a part. Astrology colored Renaissance ideas about the body and gender, and thus is instrumental in deepening our understanding of this eccentric play. Reading The Winter’s Tale with astrological awareness offers a new reading of the play’s gender dynamics, and shows that Shakespeare was lampooning the acts of tyrants who fear the regenerative power of feminine agency

A semi-automated approach to model architectural elements in Scan-to-BIM processes

In the last years, the AEC (Architecture, Engineering and Construction) domain has exponentially increased the use of BIM and HBIM models for several applications, such as planning renovation and restoration, building maintenance, cost managing, or structural/energetic retrofit design. However, obtaining detailed as-built BIM models is a demanding and time-consuming process. Especially in historical contexts, many different and complex architectural elements need to be carefully and manually modelled. Meshes or surfaces and NURBS or polylines, derived from 3D reality-based data, are recently used as a reference for the HBIM accurate modelling. This work proposes a comprehensive and novel semi-automated approach to reconstruct architectural elements through the Visual Programming Language (VPL) Dynamo software and a Boundary-Representation method (B-rep), starting from 3D surveying data and point clouds classification. A wide package of scripts provides solutions for modelling complex shapes and transferring the obtained 3D models into BIM Authoring tools for a complete reconstruction phase. The presented procedure, useful for different BIM or HBIM applications, proved to reduce the modelling time significantly

BENCHMARKING THE EXTRACTION OF 3D GEOMETRY FROM UAV IMAGES WITH DEEP LEARNING METHODS

3D reconstruction from single and multi-view stereo images is still an open research topic, despite the high number of solutions proposed in the last decades. The surge of deep learning methods has then stimulated the development of new methods using monocular (MDE, Monocular Depth Estimation), stereoscopic and Multi-View Stereo (MVS) 3D reconstruction, showing promising results, often comparable to or even better than traditional methods. The more recent development of NeRF (Neural Radial Fields) has further triggered the interest for this kind of solution. Most of the proposed approaches, however, focus on terrestrial applications (e.g., autonomous driving or small artefacts 3D reconstructions), while airborne and UAV acquisitions are often overlooked. The recent introduction of new datasets, such as UseGeo has, therefore, given the opportunity to assess how state-of-the-art MDE, MVS and NeRF 3D reconstruction algorithms perform using airborne UAV images, allowing their comparison with LiDAR ground truth. This paper aims to present the results achieved by two MDE, two MVS and two NeRF approaches levering deep learning approaches, trained and tested using the UseGeo dataset. This work allows the comparison with a ground truth showing the current state of the art of these solutions and providing useful indications for their future development and improvement

Lignin biomarkers as tracers of mercury sources in lakes water column

This study presents the role of specific terrigenous organic compounds as important vectors of mercury (Hg) transported from watersheds to lakes of the Canadian boreal forest. In order to differentiate the autochthonous from the allochthonous organic matter (OM), lignin derived biomarker signatures [Lambda, S/V, C/V, P/(V ? S), 3,5-Bd/V and (Ad/Al)v] were used. Since lignin is exclusively produced by terrigenous plants, this approach can give a non equivocal picture of the watershed inputs to the lakes. Moreover, it allows a characterization of the source of OM and its state of degradation. The water column of six lakes from the Canadian Shield was sampled monthly between June and September 2005. Lake total dissolved Hg concentrations and Lambda were positively correlated, meaning that Hg and ligneous inputs are linked (dissolved OM r2 = 0.62, p\0.0001; particulate OM r2 = 0.76, p\0.0001). Ratios of P/(V ? S) and 3,5-Bd/V from both dissolved OM and particulate OM of the water column suggest an inverse relationship between the progressive state of pedogenesis and maturation of the OM in soil before entering the lake, and the Hg concentrations in the water column. No relation was found between Hg levels in the lakes and the watershed flora composition—angiosperm versus gymnosperm or woody versus non-woody compounds. This study has significant implications for watershed management of ecosystems since limiting fresh terrestrial OM inputs should reduce Hg inputs to the aquatic systems. This is particularly the case for largescale land-use impacts, such as deforestation, agriculture and urbanization, associated to large quantities of soil OM being transferred to aquatic systems