Behaviour of a Geogrid Reinforced Embankment over Waste Material

The paper deals with the monitoring of a geogrid reinforced embankment, 5.0 m high and 600 m long, built to contain additional waste material in the municipal landfill in Modena (Northern Italy). The embankment was founded directly over the waste already placed in the landfill, consisting of\u27 compressible and dishomogeneus material, varying from solid urban waste to muddy industrial material. The geotechnical parameters assumed to characterize the fill soil and the waste material of the foundation soil are described. The settlements of the embankment and the forces and strains in the geogrids were monitored from the beginning of the construction until some months later. The instrumentation used in order to perform this control is described. The actual results are compared with those obtained from the design model and with other field tests concerning geogrid reinforced structures

Some triviality results for quasi-Einstein manifolds and Einstein warped products

In this paper we prove a number of triviality results for Einstein warped products and quasi-Einstein manifolds using different techniques and under assumptions of various nature. In particular we obtain and exploit gradient estimates for solutions of weighted Poisson-type equations and adaptations to the weighted setting of some Liouville-type theorems.Comment: 15 pages, fixed minor mistakes in Section

Operative Treatment and Clinical Outcomes in Peripheral Vascular Trauma: The Combined Experience of Two Centers in the Endovascular Era

Background: Arterial traumas of the extremities are quite rare in civilian records; nevertheless, patients with trauma of limbs are admitted daily in emergency departments worldwide. The upto-date information about epidemiology and treatment (open vs. endovascular surgery) comes from war records and it is not always easy getting data on mortality and morbidity in these patients. The aim of this study is to analyze the approach (open or endovascular) and the outcome of patients with vascular trauma of upper limbs (from the subclavian artery) and/or lower limbs (distal to the inguinal ligament), in the greater Milan area. Methods: A retrospective analysis was conducted on data recorded by the emergency departments of two hospitals of the greater Milan between 2009 and 2017. We collected all patients with arterial injuries of the limbs in terms of demography, injury patterns, clinical status at admission, therapy (open or endovascular approach), and outcomes in terms of limb salvage and survival. Results: We studied 52 patients with vascular trauma of extremities. The main mechanism of trauma was road accident (48.1%), followed by criminal acts (32.7%), self-endangering behavior (13.5%), work (3.8%), and sport accidents (1.9%). Associated lesions (orthopedic, neurological, and/or venous lesions of the limbs) were present in 39 patients (75%). All patients underwent emergency surgery, forty-six patients (88.5%) by open repair (polytetrafluoroethylene or greater saphenous vein bypass grafts, arterial suture or ligation), whereas endovascular approach was used only in 6 patients (11.5%), all treated with embolization. The overall postoperative mortality rate was 5.7% (3 patients). Among survivors, we report 5 major amputations of the lower limbs, 3 of them after bypass graft infection, and 2 after graft failure. The rate of limb salvage was 90.4%. Conclusions: Isolated arterial trauma of the extremities are rare, usually they occur in the setting of multiple trauma patients. Despite progresses in surgical techniques, there are still controversies in diagnosis and treatment of these patients. We treated most cases with open surgery (n = 46), choosing endovascular approach (embolization performed mainly by interventional radiologists) in difficult anatomic districts. We believe that, during decision-making of the surgical strategy, it is important to consider the anatomical site of lesions and the general condition of the patients. Moreover, in case of multiple trauma, we suggest a multidisciplinary approach to provide the best medical care to the victims

Fast shower simulation in the ATLAS calorimeter

The time to simulate pp collisions in the ATLAS detector is largely dominated by the showering of electromagnetic particles in the heavy parts of the detector, especially the electromagnetic barrel and endcap calorimeters. Two procedures have been developed to accelerate the processing time of electromagnetic particles in these regions: (1) a fast shower parameterisation and (2) a frozen shower library. Both work by generating the response of the calorimeter to electrons and positrons with Geant 4, and then reintroduce the response into the simulation at runtime. In the fast shower parameterisation technique, a parameterisation is tuned to single electrons and used later by simulation. In the frozen shower technique, actual showers from low-energy particles are used in the simulation. Full Geant 4 simulation is used to develop showers down to ~1 GeV, at which point the shower is terminated by substituting a frozen shower. Judicious use of both techniques over the entire electromagnetic portion of the ATLAS calorimeter produces an important improvement of CPU time. We discuss the algorithms and their performance in this paper

New value from food and industrial wastes - bioaccumulation of omega-3 fatty acids from an oleaginous microbial biomass paired with a brewery by-product using black soldier fly (Hermetia illucens) larvae.

Research on bioconversion based on insects is intensifying as it addresses the problem of reducing and reusing food and industrial waste. To reach this goal, we need to find more means of pairing waste to insects. With this goal, brewers\u2019 spent grains (BSG) - a food waste of the brewing industry - paired with the oleaginous biomass of the thraustochytrid Schizochytrium limacinum cultivated on crude glycerol - a major waste of biodiesel production - were successfully used to grow Hermetia illucens larvae. Combining BSG and S. limacinum in the diet in an attempt to design the lipid profile of H. illucens larvae to contain a higher percentage of omega-3 fatty acids is novel. Insect larvae were grown on three different substrates: i) standard diet for Diptera (SD), ii) BSG, and iii) BSG + 10% S. limacinum biomass. The larvae and substrates were analyzed for fatty acid composition and larval growth was measured until 25% of insects reached the prepupal stage. Our data showed that including omega-3-rich S. limacinum biomass in the BSG substrate promoted an increase in larval weight compared to larvae fed on SD or BSG substrates. Furthermore, it was possible, albeit in a limited way, to incorporate omega-3 fatty acids, principally docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) from BSG + S. limacinum substrate containing 20% of DHA into the larval fat (7% DHA). However, H. illucens with this level of DHA may not be suitable if the aim is to get larvae with high omega-3 lipids to feed carnivorous fish

Geant4 studies of the CNAO facility system for hadrontherapy treatment of uveal melanomas

The Italian National Centre of Hadrontherapy for Cancer Treatment (CNAO -Centro Nazionale di Adroterapia Oncologica) in Pavia, Italy, has started the treatment of selected cancers with the first patients in late 2011. In the coming months at CNAO plans are to activate a new dedicated treatment line for irradiation of uveal melanomas using the available active beam scan. The beam characteristics and the experimental setup should be tuned in order to reach the necessary precision required for such treatments. Collaboration between CNAO foundation, University of Pavia and INFN has started in 2011 to study the feasibility of these specialised treatments by implementing a MC simulation of the transport beam line and comparing the obtained simulation results with measurements at CNAO. The goal is to optimise an eye-dedicated transport beam line and to find the best conditions for ocular melanoma irradiations. This paper describes the Geant4 toolkit simulation of the CNAO setup as well as a modelised human eye with a tumour inside. The Geant4 application could be also used to test possible treatment planning systems. Simulation results illustrate the possibility to adapt the CNAO standard transport beam line by optimising the position of the isocentre and the addition of some passive elements to better shape the beam for this dedicated study

Genotype x nutrition interactions in European sea bass (Dicentrarchus labrax): effects on gut health and intestinal microbiota

One of the main objectives of the present study was an effective replacement of dietary fishmeal/fish oil (FM/FO) by new raw materials without negatively affecting European sea bass (Dicentrarchus labrax) performance and health status within a selection breeding context. The genomic selection of this species is still in its infancy if compared to salmonids and in particular, the role of D.labrax genome in shaping the gut microbiome, has been scarcely investigated. Wildtype (WT) and selected (GS) sea bass were fed with two diets: a control (20% FM/ 5–9% FO), and a “future” (F) diet, in which FM was decreased to 10% being replaced by poultry meal, whereas FO was completely replaced by a blend of rapeseed, poultry, and algae oils. The morphological evaluation of the intestine revealed a well-organized folding pattern and a conserved gut epithelial barrier for all fish groups. Despite a basal level of inflammation in the proximal intestine of WT fish, no differences were observed neither in the morphometric characteristics of goblet cells nor in the expression of GALT-related genes in response to fish genotype or diet. At distal intestine, WT fish showed a higher inflammatory status and larger goblet cells than GS fish and within the same genotype, fish fed the F diet had in general larger goblet cells. In distal intestine, a significant effect was found on the expression of 3 out of 7 target GALT genes. In particular, the expression of cytokines il-1β, tnf-α, and il-10 was different, showing an interaction effect diet x genotype. Diet had a lower influence upon gut bacterial composition than genotype. Indeed, regardless of the diet, WT fish showed higher species richness than GS genotype and this could be a direct consequence of selective breeding for multiple traits selection including growth, external morphology for lower abdominal fat deposition and adaptation to multiple and successive feed sources and composition across generations of selection. Furthermore, the gut microbiota of GS fish shared a reduced individual variability, indicating an enhanced capacity to cope with changes in diet composition. The less changes of GS sea bass at the level of gut bacterial composition in cumulating data collected with the feeds, demonstrate a capacity to reshape their microbiota thus better adapting to the diet, but with no negative impact on their growth performances, and even a better growth. A significant genotype effect was found for specific bacterial taxa, such as Paracoccus genus and other genera belonging to Moraxellaceae family, which were enriched in WT fish, regardless of the diet. Interestingly, the relative abundance of Paracoccus genus was positively correlated with higher proinflammatory cytokine il-1β expression found in distal intestine of wildtype sea bass

Functional additives in a selected european sea bass (Dicentrarchus labrax) genotype: effects on the stress response and gill antioxidant response to hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) treatment.

Husbandry practices in aquaculture production may lead to stress processes and oxidative stress damages on fish tissues. Functional ingredients have profiled as suitable candidates for reinforcing the fish antioxidant response and stress tolerance. In addition, selective breeding strategies have also demonstrated a correlation between fish growth and stress reactiveness, which may be a key component in species domestication. The present study evaluates the potential of three different functional additives for gill endogenous antioxidant capacity and stress relief in a growth selected genotype of European sea bass (Dicentrarchus labrax) juveniles fed low-FM/FO diets. For this purpose, after 72 days of a feeding trial, all fish were subjected to an oxidative stress challenge consisting of a 1 h bath exposure to hydrogen peroxide (H2O2 ) at a total concentration of 50 ppm. The functional additives induced a better recovery from the stress process, with a higher reduction in fish circulating plasma cortisol 24 h after oxidative stress. In addition, the functional additives induced higher catalase gill gene expression in response to the oxidative stress insult

Summary of the SUSY Working Group of the 1999 Les Houches Workshop

The results obtained by the Working Group on Supersymmetry at the 1999 Les Houches Workshop on Collider Physics are summarized. Separate chapters treat "general" supersymmetry, R-parity violation, gauge mediated supersymmetry breaking, and anomaly mediated supersymmetry breaking.Comment: LaTeX, 110 pages with numerous .ps and .eps files. proc.tex is main tex fil