Advanced Tethered Application and Related Technologies

APPLICATION OF TETHERED SYSTEMS ARE SUBJECT OF A NUMBER OF FEASIBILITY STUDIES AGlNG ACTUALLY PERFORMED BOTH IN US AND IN ITALY. THE ITALIAN PSN (PIANO SPAZIALE NAZIONALE) HAS AWARDED TO AERITALIA A LARGE STUDY FDR THE IDENTIFICATION OF THESE APPLICATIONS THAT lNDICATE PROMISES OF SCIENTIFIC AND APPLIED R~SEARCH AND FOR THE DEFINITION OF THE GOALS OF DEMONSTRATION FLIGHTS FOR TESTING THE FUNDAMENTAL FEATURES OF TH~ SELECTED POTENTIAL CONCEPTS

SEEDS - THE INTERNATIONAL MASTER PROGRAM FOR PREPARING THE YOUNG SYSTEMS ENGINEERS FOR SPACE EXPLORATION

The SEEDS initiative originated by Politecnico di Torino and Thales Alenia Space Italy in 2005. It aimed at establishing a Post Graduate International Master Course in Space Exploration and Development Systems "SEEDS", to offer an opportunity to young engineers to get prepared for the future of Europe in space exploration. The SEEDS project has been shared with Supaero Toulouse in France and with University at Bremen (together with ZARM) in Germany, as the three European towns (Torino, Toulouse and Bremen) have a long common tradition of space activities at both the industrial and academic level and represent three poles of the European cooperation in space programs. The SEEDS course comprises two different steps in sequence: an initial Learning Phase and a Project Work Phase. Both the Learning and the Project Work Phase pursue a multidisciplinary approach, where all specialized disciplines are blended together and integrated to enable the students to acquire the system view and then to accomplish the conceptual design, through the Systems Engineering approach, of a selected case-study. The distinguishing feature of SEEDS is without any doubt the Project Work activity, performed by all students together under the supervision of academic and industrial Tutors, coordinated by the Education Project Manager. Main objective of the Project Work is to train the students on the basic principles of the System Engineering Design, through their application on a well defined project related to a specific space exploration mission. The Project Work includes the Preparatory Work, during which the students, starting from the definition of the mission statement, focus on the identification of the complete architecture of the space exploration mission, and the Conceptual Design activities, performed in the three European sites to develop a limited number of building blocks identified during the Preparatory Work. The first year of activity started in November 2005, with a Plenary Opening which took place at the ESA-ERASMUS Centre, Noordwijk, with the full support of the Human Space-Flight Microgravity and Exploration Directorate of ESA. Five years of activities have passed since then and five project works have been successfully completed, dealing with various space exploration themes. This paper focuses on the description of the SEEDS course and on the main results achieved in terms of project work activities and development of the future space workforce. The positive experience of five years of SEEDS is brought to evidence and the lessons learned are discussed in view of the SEEDS continuatio

Adherence issues related to sublingual immunotherapy as perceived by allergists

Objectives: Sublingual immunotherapy (SLIT) is a viable alternative to subcutaneous immunotherapy to treat allergic rhinitis and asthma, and is widely used in clinical practice in many European countries. The clinical efficacy of SLIT has been established in a number of clinical trials and meta-analyses. However, because SLIT is self-administered by patients without medical supervision, the degree of patient adherence with treatment is still a concern. The objective of this study was to evaluate the perception by allergists of issues related to SLIT adherence. Methods: We performed a questionnaire-based survey of 296 Italian allergists, based on the adherence issues known from previous studies. The perception of importance of each item was assessed by a VAS scale ranging from 0 to 10. Results: Patient perception of clinical efficacy was considered the most important factor (ranked 1 by 54% of allergists), followed by the possibility of reimbursement (ranked 1 by 34%), and by the absence of side effects (ranked 1 by 21%). Patient education, regular follow-up, and ease of use of SLIT were ranked first by less than 20% of allergists. Conclusion: These findings indicate that clinical efficacy, cost, and side effects are perceived as the major issues influencing patient adherence to SLIT, and that further improvement of adherence is likely to be achieved by improving the patient information provided by prescribers. © 2010 Scurati et al, publisher and licensee Dove Medical Press Ltd

A survey of clinical features of allergic rhinitis in adults

Background: Allergic rhinitis (AR) has high prevalence and substantial socio-economic burden. Material/Methods: The study included 35 Italian Centers recruiting an overall number of 3383 adult patients with rhinitis (48% males, 52% females, mean age 29.1, range 18\u201345 years). For each patient, the attending physician had to fill in a standardized questionnaire, covering, in particular, some issues such as the ARIA classification of allergic rhinitis (AR), the results of skin prick test (SPT), the kind of treatment, the response to treatment, and the satisfaction with treatment. Results: Out of the 3383 patients with rhinitis, 2788 (82.4%) had AR: 311 (11.5%) had a mild intermittent, 229 (8.8%) a mild persistent, 636 (23.5%) a moderate-severe intermittent, and 1518 (56.1%) a moderate-severe persistent form. The most frequently used drugs were oral antihistamines (77.1%) and topical corticosteroids (60.8%). The response to treatment was judged as excellent in 12.2%, good in 41.3%, fair in 31.2%, poor in 14.5%, and very bad in 0.8% of subjects. The rate of treatment dissatisfaction was significantly higher in patients with moderate-to-severe AR than in patients with mild AR (p<0.0001). Indication to allergen immunotherapy (AIT) was significantly more frequent (p<0.01) in patients with severe AR than with mild AR. . Conclusions: These fndings confirm the appropriateness of ARIA guidelines in classifying the AR patients and the association of severe symptoms with unsuccessful drug treatment. The optimal targeting of patients to be treated with AIT needs to be reassessed

Five years of the international SEEDS Mster Course. A contribution to space exploration

The experience gained from the first five years of the international postgraduate programme in Space Exploration and Development Systems (SEEDS) is descrived. Difficulties and future perspectives are discusse

Five years of the international SEEDS Mster Course. A contribution to space exploration

The experience gained from the first five years of the international postgraduate programme in Space Exploration and Development Systems (SEEDS) is descrived. Difficulties and future perspectives are discusse

ITINERANT HUMAN OUTPOST FOR FUTURE SPACE EXPLORATION

The exploration of space has so far been attempted only through a limited sequence of missions, not strictly linked among them in terms of accumulation of achieved experience and hardware utilization. The paper presents an innovative approach to the exploration of regions beyond Low Earth Orbit, which is assumed to occur through an orderly sequence of interlinked missions, targeted to specific locations, where human outposts are put in place, to progressively enlarge the boundaries of human presence in the Solar System. Each human outpost is built “on the shoulders” of the precedent one, through physical transfer at the new location of all or at least some of the major building blocks of the previous outpost. Dedicated building blocks may also be considered to build up the final architecture of the new outpost. The new approach proposes therefore the development of an “Itinerant Human Outpost” for future space exploration, growing eventually in complexity and transforming itself. At each step of the space exploration journey the outpost is utilized as technology and operation test-bed to prepare the “next step”. The sequence of locations starts with an Equatorial Low Earth Orbit Human Outpost. Next locations are Earth-Moon Lagrangian Points, Near Earth Asteroids Region, Low Lunar Orbits and Martian Orbits to finally build up Martian human outposts in Low Martian Orbits or on one Martian natural satellite. The overall scenario can be considered the “Grand Tour of the Earth Neighbours”, performed by the “Itinerant Human Outposts”, whose successive multiple utilization and growth potential have to be taken into account as design requirements of each building block. The practice of introducing in the design the “Revolutionary Approach” of the “6R Space Systems”, i.e. the “Repairable, Refurbishable, Replaceable, Reconfigurable, Retrievable and Reusable Space Systems”, has to be adopted as well, in order to optimize in the long term the costs of the outposts building up and of their operations, even if in the front end such an approach requires more complex and costing solutions. The paper describes into some detail the proposed new approach, establishes the main requirements and defines the System of Systems Architecture of the first Human Outpost in Equatorial Low Earth Orbit. The significant endeavours, required to sustain over quite a long period of time such an initiative, are going to offer to new generations perspectives that will act as catalyst of economical growth and will encourage the involvement of the Private Sector