A molecular protocol to distinguish syntopic Galapagos land iguanas (Conolophus marthae and C. subcristatus) from faecal samples

When species are endangered, rare, or hard-to-sample, noninvasive sampling methods may prove useful for the purposes of genetic studies or for collecting evidence of the presence of a species. We developed and applied a molecular protocol to rapidly distinguish two syntopic species of Galápagos land iguana (Conolophus marthae and C. subcristatus) using stool samples. We used PCR for the amplification a short region of the mtDNA control region, followed by a selective restriction reaction. The protocol, relatively inexpensive and easy to use, does not require DNA sequencing. It proved highly efficient when applied on fresh feces, while its efficiency decreased to 17% for those that had been exposed to the environment for several days or weeks. Our protocol will prove useful when feces are used to collect indirect information about the diet and geographic occurrence of C. marthae

A 50 l CYGNO prototype overground characterization

The nature of dark matter is still unknown and an experimental program to look for dark matter particles in our Galaxy should extend its sensitivity to light particles in the GeV mass range and exploit the directional information of the DM particle motion (Vahsen et al. in CYGNUS: feasibility of a nuclear recoil observatory with directional sensitivity to dark matter and neutrinos, arXiv:2008.12587, 2020). The CYGNO project is studying a gaseous time projection chamber operated at atmospheric pressure with a Gas Electron Multiplier (Sauli in Nucl Instrum Meth A 386:531, https://doi.org/10.1016/S0168-9002(96)01172-2, 1997) amplification and with an optical readout as a promising technology for light dark matter and directional searches. In this paper we describe the operation of a 50 l prototype named LIME (Long Imaging ModulE) in an overground location at Laboratori Nazionali di Frascati (LNF) of INFN. This prototype employs the technology under study for the 1 cubic meter CYGNO demonstrator to be installed at the Laboratori Nazionali del Gran Sasso (LNGS) (Amaro et al. in Instruments 2022, 6(1), https://www.mdpi.com/2410-390X/6/1/6, 2022). We report the characterization of LIME with photon sources in the energy range from few keV to several tens of keV to understand the performance of the energy reconstruction of the emitted electron. We achieved a low energy threshold of few keV and an energy resolution over the whole energy range of 10–20%, while operating the detector for several weeks continuously with very high operational efficiency. The energy spectrum of the reconstructed electrons is then reported and will be the basis to identify radio-contaminants of the LIME materials to be removed for future CYGNO detectors

Charge amplification in low pressure CF4:SF6:He mixtures with a multi-mesh ThGEM for directional dark matter searches

The CYGNO collaboration is developing next generation directional Dark Matter (DM) detection experiments, using gaseous Time Projection Chambers (TPCs), as a robust method for identifying Weakly Interacting Massive Particles (WIMPs) below the Neutrino Fog. SF6 is potentially ideal for this since it provides a high fluorine content, enhancing sensitivity to spin-dependent interactions and, as a Negative Ion Drift (NID) gas, reduces charge diffusion leading to improved positional resolution. CF4, although not a NID gas, has also been identified as a favourable gas target as it provides a scintillation signal which can be used for a complimentary light/charge readout approach. These gases can operate at low pressures to elongate Nuclear Recoil (NR) tracks and facilitate directional measurements. In principle, He could be added to low pressure SF6/CF4 without significant detriment to the length of 16S, 12C, and 19F recoils. This would improve the target mass, sensitivity to lower WIMP masses, and offer the possibility of atmospheric operation; potentially reducing the cost of a containment vessel. In this article, we present gas gain and energy resolution measurements, taken with a Multi-Mesh Thick Gaseous Electron Multiplier (MMThGEM), in low pressure SF6 and CF4:SF6 mixtures following the addition of He. We find that the CF4:SF6:He mixtures tested were able to produce gas gains on the order of 104 up to a total pressure of 100 Torr. These results demonstrate an order of magnitude improvement [1] in charge amplification in NID gas mixtures with a He component

Data handling of CYGNO experiment using INFN-Cloud solution

The INFN Cloud project was launched at the beginning of 2020, aiming to build a distributed Cloud infrastructure and provide advanced services for the INFN scientific communities. A Platform as a Service (PaaS) was created inside INFN Cloud that allows the experiments to develop and access resources as a Software as a Service (SaaS), and CYGNO is the betatester of this system. The aim of the CYGNO experiment is to realize a large gaseous Time Projection Chamber based on the optical readout of the photons produced in the avalanche multiplication of ionization electrons in a GEM stack. To this extent, CYGNO exploits the progress in commercial scientific Active Pixel Sensors based on Scientific CMOS for Dark Matter search and Solar Neutrino studies. CYGNO, like many other astroparticle experiments, requires a computing model to acquire, store, simulate and analyze data typically far from High Energy Physics (HEP) experiments. Indeed, astroparticle experiments are typically characterized by being less demanding of computing resources with respect to HEP ones but have to deal with unique and unrepeatable data, sometimes collected in extreme conditions, with extensive use of templates and montecarlo, and are often re-calibrated and reconstructed many times for a given data set. Moreover, the varieties and the scale of computing models and requirements are extremely large. In this scenario, the Cloud infrastructure with standardized and optimized services offered to the scientific community could be a useful solution able to match the requirements of many small/medium size experiments. In this work, we will present the CYGNO computing model based on the INFN cloud infrastructure where the experiment software, easily extendible to similar experiments to similar applications on other similar experiments, provides tools as a service to store, archive, analyze, and simulate data

Kinetic Calendar for Emotional vs Physical Stress Tracking in Women

This work aims to address the need of creating visualization tools for better self-awareness of not visible daily life conditions, such as stress and emotional peaks, to facilitate the detection of patterns that could be related to some physical symptoms. It is focused on women because of the constant hormonal changes and the close relation of these with stress responses; and the fact that women are more likely to present psychosomatic disorders. Women who reported been affected with this condition, remembered not being able to relate the emotional cause of the symptom until after the diagnose. That would usually trigger a vicious cycle of stress and frustration that would worsen symptom. In the literature review it was found that psychosomatic disorders affect women in a 2:1 ratio compared to male pairs, due to biological, socio-economic, and cultural differences. It was also found that emotional self-awareness might decrease somatic related symptoms and that heart rate variability might be a valuable tool in the target tracking of users’ physical conditions in a near future. This kind of tools might not only serve as visual feedback but also it can help the physicians to detect patterns or relations for some common mental-related affections