Thermography to assess grapevine status and traits opportunities and limitations in crop monitoring and phenotyping – a review

Mestrado em Engenharia de Viticultura e Enologia (Double degree) / Instituto Superior de Agronomia. Universidade de Lisboa / Faculdade de Ciências. Universidade do PortoClimate change and the increasing water shortage pose increasing challenges to agriculture and viticulture, especially in typically dry and hot areas such as the Mediterranean and demand for solutions to use water resources more effectively. For this reason, new tools are needed to precisely monitor water stress in crops such as grapevine in order to save irrigation water, while guaranteeing yield. Imaging technologies and remote sensing tools are becoming more common in agriculture and plant/crop science research namely to perform phenotyping/selection or for crop stress monitoring purposes. Thermography emerged as important tool for the industry and agriculture. It allows detection of the emitted infrared thermal radiation and conversion of infrared radiation into temperature distribution maps. Considering that leaf temperature is a feasible indicator of stress and/or stomatal behavior, thermography showed to be capable to support characterization of novel genotypes and/or monitor crop’s stress. However, there are still limitations in the use of the technique that need to be minimized such as the accuracy of thermal data due to variable weather conditions, limitations due to the high costs of the equipment/platforms and limitations related to image analysis and processing to extract meaningful thermal data. This work revises the role of remote sensing and imaging in modern viticulture as well as the advantages and disadvantages of thermography and future developments, focusing on viticultureN/

ASSOCIAZIONE TRA COLESTEROLO DELLE DIVERSE FRAZIONI LIPOPROTEICHE ED ATEROSCLEROSI SUBCLINICA IN UN CAMPIONE DI DONNE NAPOLETANE

Il colesterolo plasmatico costituisce un ormai consolidato fattore di rischio cardiovascolare. La riduzione della colesterolemia e del colesterolo LDL diminuisce sia il rischio di coronaropatia che di ictus. Tuttavia, anche in soggetti che con terapia ipocolesterolemizzante raggiungono l’obiettivo di colesterolo LDL prefissato, permane un rischio di mortalità e morbilità per malattia cardiovascolare (rischio residuo). Scopo della presente tesi è stato di valutare la relazione tra colesterolo contenuto nelle sottoclassi lipoproteiche (VLDL, IDL, LDL, HDL) e lo spessore medio-intimale carotideo (IMT) o la presenza di placca carotidea, in una popolazione di donne in età post-menopausale. Le sottoclassi lipoproteiche sono state dosate con il sistema Lipoprint®, metodica basata sulla pre-colorazione delle frazioni lipidiche sieriche con Sudan black e sulla successiva elettroforesi in gradiente di gel di poliacrilammide al 3% non-denaturato. Lo IMT, marker surrogato di aterosclerosi subclinica maggiormente studiato ed utilizzato, è stato valutato mediante esame ultrasonografico B-mode. Le donne costituenti il campione (n=228) avevano un’età compresa tra 43 ed 81 anni (età media di 63 anni), un IMC medio di 28.2 kg/m2 e valori medi di colesterolemia di 224 mg/dl. Le VLDL-C erano correlate positivamente e in maniera statisticamente significativa con l’IMT (r=0.26, p<0.001). Sebbene anche le LDL e IDL erano associate ad IMT, solo l’associazione tra le VLDL-C ed IMT si confermava dopo correzione per i principali fattori confondenti. Inoltre, dopo stratificazione in tertili, il II ed il III tertile di VLDL-C sono risultati associati ad un rischio doppio rispetto al I tertile di presentare placche carotidee a livello della carotide comune (p< 0.05). In conclusione, il presente lavoro indica che elevati livelli di VLDL-C sono direttamente correlati ad aterosclerosi carotidea, indipendentemente dai principali fattori di rischio cardiovascolari. Il loro dosaggio mediante la metodica Lipoprint® rappresenta, quindi, un utile strumento per la quantificazione del rischio cardiovascolare

INFLUENZA DELLA TECNICA IRRIGUA SULLA COLTIVAZIONE IN VASO DEL GERANIO (Pelargonium peltatum L.)

La tesi riporta i risultati di una sperimentazione condotta presso il Dipartimento di Biologia delle Piante Agrarie di Pisa, in collaborazione con l’ ARSIA (Regione Toscana) e con il CNR-IBIMET di Firenze, per verificare l’influenza di diversi sistemi di irrigazione sulla coltivazione in vaso del geranio (Pelargonium peltatum L.). Sono state condotte due prove, una a carattere preliminare nella primavera del 2004 ed un’altra nell’anno seguente. Nella prova condotta sono state confrontate diverse tipologie di somministrazione della soluzione nutritiva: irrigazione a goccia a ciclo aperto o a ciclo chiuso; subirrigazione per scorrimento su canaletta (a ciclo chiuso). Nelle tesi ora citate la somministrazione dell’acqua è stata pilotata tramite timer o impiegando dei tensiometri idraulici che provvedevano ad aprire l’impianto di irrigazione per un tempo prefissato ogni volta la tensione d’umidità nel substrato scendeva a -60 hPa. Lo schema sperimentale prevedeva anche l’impiego di due tipi di acqua irrigua a diversa salinità, bassa o alta. Le analisi condotte durante la coltivazione e a fine ciclo hanno messo in evidenza che usando acqua di buona qualità non ci sono effetti significativi sulla crescita delle piante; al contrario, se viene utilizzata acqua ad alta salinità si ha una riduzione della crescita nel caso dei sistemi chiusi, in particolare con la subirrigazione

Occupational health and safety issues in human-robot collaboration: State of the art and open challenges

Human-Robot Collaboration (HRC) refers to the interaction of workers and robots in a shared workspace. Owing to the integration of the industrial automation strengths with the inimitable cognitive capabilities of humans, HRC is paramount to move towards advanced and sustainable production systems. Although the overall safety of collaborative robotics has increased over time, further research efforts are needed to allow humans to operate alongside robots, with awareness and trust. Numerous safety concerns are open, and either new or enhanced technical, procedural and organizational measures have to be investigated to design and implement inherently safe and ergonomic automation solutions, aligning the systems performance and the human safety. Therefore, a bibliometric analysis and a literature review are carried out in the present paper to provide a comprehensive overview of Occupational Health and Safety (OHS) issues in HRC. As a result, the most researched topics and application areas, and the possible future lines of research are identified. Reviewed articles stress the central role played by humans during collaboration, underlining the need to integrate the human factor in the hazard analysis and risk assessment. Human-centered design and cognitive engineering principles also require further investigations to increase the worker acceptance and trust during collaboration. Deepened studies are compulsory in the healthcare sector, to investigate the social and ethical implications of HRC. Whatever the application context is, the implementation of more and more advanced technologies is fundamental to overcome the current HRC safety concerns, designing low-risk HRC systems while ensuring the system productivity

Life cycle analysis of innovative building materials based on circular coffee ground supply chain

The construction sector is widely recognized as one of the most polluting mainly due to its intensive exploitation of natural resources and large energy consumption to produce traditional building materials. In the last years, alternative building materials have been developed with the aim to reduce the environmental burden of this sector. In particular, the use of geopolymer mortars as alternative cementitious materials is gaining increasing acceptance among scientists. Numerous laboratory studies demonstrate their suitability for construction applications, highlighting the potential environmental benefits that can be obtained from their large-scale production. This study aims to perform a preliminary evaluation of the environmental performance of a geopolymer mortar, whose production includes the reuse of a food waste: Spent Coffee Ground (SCG). By using the Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) approach, an environmental comparison with a traditional production of cement mortar was carried out on the basis of the Global Warming Potential (GWP) indicator

Project management information systems (Pmiss): A statistical-based analysis for the evaluation of software packages features

Project Managers (PMs) working in competitive markets are finding Project Management Information Systems (PMISs) useful for planning, organizing and controlling projects of varying complexity. A wide variety of PMIS software is available, suitable for projects differing in scope and user needs. This paper identifies the most useful features found in PMISs. An extensive literature review and analysis of commercial software is made to identify the main features of PMISs. After-wards, the list is reduced by a panel of project management experts, and a statistical analysis is performed on data acquired by means of two different surveys. The relative importance of listed features is properly computed, and the interactions between the respondent’s profiles and PMIS features are also investigated by cluster and respondents’ analyses. The paper provides information for researchers and practitioners interested in PMISs packages and their applications. Furthermore, the analyses may help practitioners when choosing a PMIS, and also for developers of PMISs software in understanding user needs

Economic and Environmental Assessment of Biomass Power Plants in Southern Italy

In 2019, Europe adopted the New Green Deal as a strategic plan to become a competitive, resource-efficient, and driven economy by reducing its gas emissions and carbon footprint. Due the COVID-19 pandemic, this strategic plan was recently updated to expedite the green transition of European industries. Therefore, the present paper deals with the problem of deciding an appropriate size for a biomass plant that directly produces electric energy by means of two different conversion processes: combustion and gasification. After an initial estimation of the energy potential in western Sicily, GIS data of biomass growth were used to identify the appropriate size for the power plants under investigation. The economic feasibility of biomass utilization was evaluated over a capacity range of 10 to 30 MW, considering total capital investments, revenues from energy sales, and total operating costs. Moreover, the effect of variations on incentive prices was analyzed by means of a sensitivity analysis. Comparing the different plant solutions considered, the environmental sustainability was also analyzed using the life cycle assessment (LCA) approach. The results showed that the combustion solution had a higher profitability and a lower environmental impact for each plant size. The obtained results also demonstrated that providing power from residual biomass in small agricultural communities would significantly reduce their environmental impacts while improving the economic feasibility of their waste management practices

¿El art. 1424 cod. civ. como canon interpretativo del negocio inválido? Notas relativas al nuevo papel intregrativo-funcional del juez sobre los actos de autonomía privada

The present paper proposes to offer some brief reflections, in general terms, on the role of the judge with reference to the contract and, in particular, on its modalities of intervention in the event of invalidity, pursuant to and for the effects of art 1424 civ. cod. In this sense it recalls the doctrinal debate on functional profiles and on the legal nature of the institute of the conversion of the null contract. The author seems to agree with that interpretative option that see art 1424 civ. cod. as an interpretative canon of the contract (invalid) that juxtaposes to those provided for in Chapter IV of the Book IV to arts 1362 et seq. civ. cod. In this perspective, the conversion of the null contract is placed between the instruments for the ?just remedy?, independently of the specific indications of the procedural parties, thus finding in the system the most appropriate solution to implement and compose conflicting interests, respecting the values of the legal system

Electromagnetic Transients on Power Plant Connection Caused by Lightning Event

Lightning events can seriously damage the power systems and they represent one of the most dangerous causes of faults in the transmission lines. Usually, when one want to analyze such effects it is necessary to rely on approximate models or to simplify in some ways the power system. As a consequence, an overall analysis taking into account the complexity of the power system is difficult to find. This paper presents the study of the electromagnetic transients caused by lightning events in a point of connection between a real power plant and a large power grid. The analysis is achieved with a high level of details of the power system and the simulations are obtained through an EMT-type software (PSCAD-EMTDC). Different simulations are analyzed, showing how the cables and the transformers are affected by the electromagnetic transients