ECOSYSTEM SERVICES AND URBAN PLANNING Tools, methods and experiences for an integrated and sustainable territorial government

Urban planning and design for post-carbon sustainable city requires a major connection between the new scientific paradigms of environmental disciplines and useful/communicative indicators to steer local policies. Nowadays the spatially explicit assessment of Ecosystem Services (ES) and their flows can effectively support the decision making process for sustainable development. Thus the methodology of considering environmental sustainability during planning phases should be hold in plan’s construction and integrated during the decision making process at urban scale, also using Coplanning method. The paper experienced the recent research innovations made by DIST for LIFE program SAM4CP, where preliminary output of ES mapping were used as proxy for the identification of high value areas to be planned. Inside it is presented a methodology of integration betweenmapsofbiophysical/ economical ES values using InVEST software as a tool for geographic, economic and ecological accounting. The mapping activity, related to Land Cover/ Land Use information for a context based case of was used to supportthe preliminary approach to co- planning activityfor multilevel governance, especially .among consensus building approach and the Co-planning Conference. Innovations are discussed both by processual andtechnical sides: (i) the urban planning activity founded upon the Co-planning method and supported by such analysis, allowed policy makers to go into the substance for reconsider their strategies for sustainable territorial government and (ii)the scientific contribution of the research on mapping ES demonstrates that approach is today fully incorporated on local tools for land management

Integrated process of Ecosystem Services evaluation and urban planning. The experience of LIFE SAM4CP project towards sustainable and smart communities.

Evaluation of Ecosystem Services (ES) and related mapping tools and techniques can be used in urban planning and design to define sustainable land use strategies aimed to achieve resilience in urban planning. The analysis of ES improves the ability of politicians, administrators, planners and stakeholders to define strategies of regeneration, ecologically and energy efficient oriented. Furthermore, it allows to reflect about the sustainability of urbanization and related environmental issues, bringing attention to social and economic aspects, too. The soil, as measurable value common good, is a source of energy, requires a strong reduction of its consumption and a good use of it. The paper experienced the recent research innovations made by DIST for LIFE program SAM4CP, which integrates the process of planning and decision making with analysis and assessments of ES in order to support Municipalities to define policies and monitoring procedures oriented to limit the consumption of high quality soil. The process of evaluation and planning can also be adopted for urban resilient projects aimed at define successful methods for improving energy efficiency in communities and urban areas. The paper aims to present partial results of the project. A strong integration of evaluation and planning actions, providing multicriteria analysis techniques and adopting software (like InVEST) able to map the outcomes of the evaluation process and the inputs for the planning process will be discussed. An indicator based approach is presented as the innovative tool to achieve land use efficiency, and resilience as the main paradigm to steer Co-planning Conference

Ecosystem services and urban planning. Tools, methods and experiences for an integrated and sustainable territorial government

Urban planning and design for post-carbon sustainable city require a major connection between the new scientific paradigms of environmental disciplines and useful/communicative indicators to steer local policies. Nowadays the spatially explicit assessment of Ecosystem Services (ES) and their flows can effectively support the decision-making process for sustainable development. Thus the methodology of considering environmental sustainability during planning phases should be held in plan's construction and integrated during the decision making process at urban scale, also using the Co-planning method. The paper experienced the recent research innovations made by DIST for LIFE program SAM4CP, where preliminary outputs of ES mapping were used as a proxy for the identification of high-value areas to be planned. Inside it is presented a methodology of integration between maps of biophysical/economical ES values using InVEST software as a tool for geographic, economic and ecological accounting. The mapping activity, related to Land Cover/ Land Use information for a context based case of was used to support the preliminary approach to co-planning activity for multilevel governance, especially .among consensus building approach and the Co-planning Conference. Innovations are discussed both by processual and technical sides: (i) the urban planning activity founded upon the Co-planning method and supported by such analysis, allowed policy makers to go into the substance for reconsidering their strategies for sustainable territorial government and (ii) the scientific contribution of the research on mapping ES demonstrates that approach is today fully incorporated on local tools for land management

An unusual arylsulfatase A pseudodeficiency allele carrying a splice site mutation in a metachromatic leukodystrophy patient

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The Isotropic Radio Background and Annihilating Dark Matter

Observations by ARCADE-2 and other telescopes sensitive to low frequency radiation have revealed the presence of an isotropic radio background with a hard spectral index. The intensity of this observed background is found to exceed the flux predicted from astrophysical sources by a factor of approximately 5-6. In this article, we consider the possibility that annihilating dark matter particles provide the primary contribution to the observed isotropic radio background through the emission of synchrotron radiation from electron and positron annihilation products. For reasonable estimates of the magnetic fields present in clusters and galaxies, we find that dark matter could potentially account for the observed radio excess, but only if it annihilates mostly to electrons and/or muons, and only if it possesses a mass in the range of approximately 5-50 GeV. For such models, the annihilation cross section required to normalize the synchrotron signal to the observed excess is sigma v ~ (0.4-30) x 10^-26 cm^3/s, similar to the value predicted for a simple thermal relic (sigma v ~ 3 x 10^-26 cm^3/s). We find that in any scenario in which dark matter annihilations are responsible for the observed excess radio emission, a significant fraction of the isotropic gamma ray background observed by Fermi must result from dark matter as well.Comment: 11 pages, 6 figure

Deriving structure-performance relations of chemically modified chitosan binders for sustainable high-voltage LiNi0.5Mn1.5O4 cathode

Invited for this month's cover picture is the group of Prof. Dr. Stefano Passerini. The front cover illustrates the use of citric acid (co-)crosslinked bio-derived polymers, with chitosan and guar gum, as water-soluble binders for sustainable lithium-ion battery cathodes. Read the full text of the Article at 10.1002/batt.201900140. © 2020 Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinhei

Searching for gamma-ray emission from galaxy clusters at low redshift

We report the identification of a positive cross-correlation signal between the unresolved $\gamma$-ray emission, measured by the \emph{Fermi} Large Area Telescope, and four different galaxy cluster catalogues. The selected catalogues peak at low-redshift and span different frequency bands, including infrared, optical and X-rays. The signal-to-noise ratio of the detected cross-correlation amounts to 3.5 in the most significant case. We investigate and comment about its possible origin, in terms of compact $\gamma$-ray emission from AGNs inside clusters or diffuse emission from the intracluster medium. The analysis has been performed by introducing an accurate estimation of the cross-correlation power-spectrum covariance matrix, built with mock realisations of the gamma and galaxy cluster maps. Different methods to produce the mock realizations starting from the data maps have been investigated and compared, identifying suitable techniques which can be generalized to other cross-correlation studies.Comment: 24 pages, 17 figure

Deriving Structure-Performance Relations of Chemically Modified Chitosan Binders for Sustainable High-Voltage LiNi0.5_{0.5}Mn1.5_{1.5}O4_{4} Cathodes

The implementation of aqueous electrode processing for lithium‐ion positive electrodes is key towards the realization of environmentally benign and cheap battery production. One of the water‐soluble binders that has attracted most attention is chitosan, the second‐most abundant natural biopolymer. Herein, the use of chitosan for high‐voltage, cobalt‐free LiNi$_{0.5}$Mn$_{1.5}$O$_{4}$ cathodes is reported for the first time. A detailed comparison of three different grades of chitosan with varying chain length and degrees of deacetylation (DD) is provided to explore the impact of these properties on the electrochemical performance. In fact, bio‐derived chitosan with a relatively lower DD outperforms synthetic chitosan‐especially after crosslinking with citric acid‐yielding about 10 % higher capacities. Higher molecular weight appears additionally advantageous for the cycling stability. Finally, guar gum is employed as slurry thickener, co‐crosslinking with chitosan. This allows for achieving 50 % higher mass loadings than for chitosan only and stable capacities above 130 and 120 mAh g$^{-1}$ at C/3 and 1 C, respectively