Quaranta anni di attenzione all’ambiente nella Tecnologia dell’Architettura - Forty years of environmentally conscious building technology design

This short essay analyzes the environmental approach throughout the history of Architectural Technology, starting from building details up to the present attention to the smart city, land maintenance and urban retrofit, seen as complex research activities, political strategies, design and entrepreneurial actions which have the scope to transform present day urban crusts into organic textures, climatologically consistent, reactive, user-friendly, efficient and with a low environmental impact. The exercise identifies some research and teaching trends for Architectural Technology in order to promote debate and the analysis of the historical perspective and present situation of the discipline

Usability Characteristics Assessment Protocol Applied to eTouch Ultrasound User-defined workflow Optimization Tool

AbstractThe Ultrasound (US) examination time reduction is an increasing compelling request in sonographer's everyday life. The increased number of patients and the cost reduction are two opposite forces, which can lead the sonographer to work faster without caring about scanning posture. The numerous repeated actions performed can easily lead to Work-related Musculoskeletal Disorders (WRMSD). The analysis of those problems has driven to the definition and implementation of eTouch tool: user-defined Macros appositively created, automatically and sequentially saved and performed in real time by pressing a button. The present work investigates ergonomics and usability performances of a portable US system (MyLabAlpha, Esaote S.p.A., Italy) by using eTouch as well as the classical manual interface in two clinical applications (Abdominal and Vascular). performed by a skilled sonographer on a healthy subject. is. Upper-body kinematic and muscle activation of the sonographer's left arm were recorded through an optoelectronic system (SmartDx400, BTS Spa, Italy) and a multi-channel Wireless Superficial Electromyography (SEMG, Freemg300, BTS Spa, Italy). The number of keystrokes used during the manual procedure was more than 3 times higher than the one with eTouch. This difference implied a reduction of US execution time when using eTouch in comparison with manual use of about 30%. Results of the upper-body kinematic showed that the arm was extended for less time intervals when using eTouch, whereas during the manual procedure there was a greater activation of the deltoid, responsible for the elevation of the shoulder and thus the extension of the arm. SEMG analysis showed that eTouch allowed a significant reduction of muscular activation, especially for the anterior deltoideus. Our findings showed that eTouch is recommendable for decreasing WRMSD risk

Ergonomics and Workflow Evaluation of Automatic Doppler Angle Technology Implemented in a Diagnostic Ultrasound System

AbstractCommonly available Pulsed Wave Doppler (PW) flow velocity measurements for Ultrasound (US) investigation require the operator to manually set the direction of the flow velocity vector along the blood vessel axis on the US image, in order to determine the Doppler angle and then to estimate the real flow velocity. The present work investigates the possibility to implement on a commercially available US system an innovative Automatic Doppler Angle (ADA) Technology by analyzing the best workflow in terms of higher execution speed, lower keystrokes/adjustments helping in the prevention of Work-related Musculoskeletal Disorders (WRMSD) and a Doppler angle correction precision, comparable to the one obtained manually by expert sonographer. Ergonomics and workflow tests, then accuracy and repeatability evaluations of the Doppler velocity measurement, were performed on a portable US system (MyLabAlpha, Esaote S.p.A., Florence, Italy) by an expert sonographer. Ergonomics and workflow Tests were performed to analyze the potential of ADA in terms of reduction of muscular activation applied (by SEMG), number of activations (by cameras optoelectronic system) and time needed using ADA, in comparison to manual procedure. Accuracy and intra-operator repeatability tests of the velocity measurement were performed to evaluate the precision of the obtained PW trace velocity measurements with ADA technology, compared to manual ones. Results provided evidence that ADA tool allowed: a reduction of muscular activation (from 12% for trapezius descendens, to 25% for deltoideus anterior) a lower total number of keystrokes and a reduction of the US scan time of about 56%. The maximal variation between PW Doppler trace velocity measurement set automatically by ADA and set manually by sonographer was 11%. ADA technology can provide a Doppler angle correction precision comparable to the manual one, while decreasing the risk of WRMSD

Effects of water stress on spectral reflectance of bermudagrass

In the south-central Italy, during summer rainfall does not supply a sufficient amount of water. Therefore, irrigation management during dry periods is important for maintaining turf quality. The hybrid bermudagrass (Cynodon dactylon (L.) Pers. × Cynodon transvaalensis Burtt–Davy) is known to represent the dominant warm-season turfgrass in warm to temperate climatic regions and its drought tolerance make bermudagrass a competitive turfgrass. A greenhouse experiment was conducted using uniform cores of hybrid bermudagrass, which were secured in a polyvinyl chloride cylinders and watered by constant sub-irrigation. The objectives of the present research were to measure the spectral reflectance with a new generation handheld spectroradiometer on hybrid bermudagrass and to explore various vegetation indices to be used as future detecting tool to study water stress in bermudagrass. Moreover, the potential uses of multivariate processing techniques for discriminating different water stress conditions in turfgrass has been investigated. Besides spectral indices, multivariate methods, although performed on a data set limited in terms of sample size, have shown a great potential for water stress monitoring in turfgrass and surely deserve further investigations. There are different indices that use distinct water absorption features independent of chlorophyll concentration, such as water index (WI = R900/R970) that has been reported to be a robust index of canopy water content and is used as an active indicator of changes in Leaf Relative Water Content (LRWC). Also, the ratio of WI with NDVI (WI/NDVI = (R900/R970)/((R800 − R680)/(R800 + R680)]) was found to be an effective indicator of water stress. Another vegetation index to detect water features is normalized difference water index (NDWI), designed to maximize reflectance of water by using green wavelengths. In our trial in bermudagrass the relationships studied, suggest that WI (900/970) and WI/NDVI, among the indices studied, are the more effective indicators of water stress. In fact, lower values of WI indicate higher water stress, while higher values of WI/NDVI indicate higher water stress levels

Fungal diversity and occurrence of mycotoxin producing fungi in tropical vineyards.

Grapevine cultivars are distributed worldwide, nevertheless the fermentation of its grape berries renders distinct wine products that are highly associated to the local fungal community. Despite the symbiotic association between wine and the fungal metabolism, impacting both the terroir and mycotoxin production, few studies have explored the vineyard ecosystem fungal community using both molecular marker sequencing and mycotoxin production assessment. In this study, we investigated the fungal community of three grapevine cultivars (Vitis vinifera L.) in two tropical vineyards. Illumina MiSeq sequencing was performed on two biocompartments: grape berries (GB) and grapevine soil (GS); yielding a total of 578,495 fungal internal transcribed spacer 1 reads, which were used for taxonomic classification. GB and GS fungal communities were mainly constituted by Ascomycota phylum. GS harbors a significant richer and more diverse fungal community than GB. Among GB samples, Syrah grape berries exclusively shared fungal community included wine-associated yeasts (e.g. Saccharomycopsis vini) that may play key roles in wine terroir. Mycotoxin production assessment revealed the high potential of Aspergillus section Flavi and Penicillium section Citrina isolates to produce aflatoxin B1-B2 and citrinin, respectively. This is the first study to employ next-generation sequencing to investigate vineyard associated fungal community in Brazil. Our findings provide valuable insights on the available tools for fungal ecology assessment applied to food products emphasizing the coexistence between classical and molecular tools

Ultrasound System Typologies, User Interfaces and Probes Design: A Review

he present review paper aims to give insights regarding what is available now, and will be in the next future, on the Market in terms of Ultrasound (US) system User Interfaces characteristics and peculiarities; US system typologies and probe typologies. Moreover, insights regarding ergonomics evaluation technologies and techniques for US systems, User Interface and transducers design evaluation, will be provided as well. The User interface ergonomics of US systems and probes is of primary importance due to the increased use in the everyday clinical practice even by non-sonographers, and the higher attention to the Work-related Musculoskeletal Disorders (WRMSD). A large overview and review of market data, side by side tests, websites, interviews to US users, marketing and sales professionals, scientific and educational publications was carried out in order to collect all available data as well as to show and describe them to the reader. Nowadays US market offers many different typologies of systems and probes, with different prices, features, quality level and targets of use. Users have to be aware to increase their level of knowledge in order to perform the best choice in terms of price/performance ratio and in terms of ergonomics and workflow requirements. The same level of knowledge is necessary also for other stakeholders of the US imaging Lab and purchasing/test decision phases such as Clinical and Biomedical Engineers involved in technical decision related to capital equipment and their maintenance. Final users expect technical innovations every 6-12 months in order to ensure technical-clinical improvements and company commitment to research and customer focus. Such characteristics are important clues showing a fast moving of the US market from a capital equipment basis to a more mass-consumer approach characterized by fast innovations, quick obsolescence and consumer prone attitude to system rotation in order to have always the more up-to-date technology, product, probe available on the Market

A Lentiviral Vector-Based, Herpes Simplex Virus 1 (HSV-1) Glycoprotein B Vaccine Affords Cross-Protection against HSV-1 and HSV-2 Genital Infections

Genital herpes is caused by herpes simplex virus 1 (HSV-1) and HSV-2, and its incidence is constantly increasing in the human population. Regardless of the clinical manifestation, HSV-1 and HSV-2 infections are highly transmissible to sexual partners and enhance susceptibility to other sexually transmitted infections. An effective vaccine is not yet available. Here, HSV-1 glycoprotein B (gB1) was delivered by a feline immunodeficiency virus (FIV) vector and tested against HSV-1 and HSV-2 vaginal challenges in C57BL/6 mice. The gB1 vaccine elicited cross-neutralizing antibodies and cell-mediated responses that protected 100 and 75% animals from HSV-1- and HSV-2-associated severe disease, respectively. Two of the eight fully protected vaccinees underwent subclinical HSV-2 infection, as demonstrated by deep immunosuppression and other analyses. Finally, vaccination prevented death in 83% of the animals challenged with a HSV-2 dose that killed 78 and 100% naive and mock-vaccinated controls, respectively. Since this FLY vector can accommodate two or more HSV immunogens, this vaccine has ample potential for improvement and may become a candidate for the development of a truly effective vaccine against genital herpes