Gypsum Dissolution Rate, New Data and Insights

Sinkholes linked to covered evaporite karst in urban environments still represent a challenge in hazard and risk assessment. The Quinis hamlet, located in Friuli Venezia Giulia region (NE Italy), is heavily affected by sinkhole phenomena (linked to an evaporitic bedrock), which deeply interested infrastructures and houses. In order to understand the evolution of the sinking phenomena, a field experiment started on the dissolution rate of the gypsum. In 17 existing piezometers, at different depths, 51 evaporitic rock samples were exposed to the naturally occurring variation of relative humidity, air flow and hydrodynamics. The rock samples were placed respectively in the aeration, in the fluctuation and in the phreatic section of the piezometric tubes. Data related to groundwater level fluctuations, temperature and electrical conductivity were collected. After four months, rock samples were removed, weighted and the volume loss evaluated. The obtained results indicate that rock sample reduction is not only dependent on the groundwater level fluctuations and on the number of days during which the samples are immersed in the groundwaters but also on the mineralization of the latter. Some of the rock samples have been almost completely dissolved, with dissolution rate values almost eight times bigger than expected if compared to the available literature data. The proposed approach had as aim to evaluate the quickness of the dissolution process, which is dependant on several causes (groundwater level fluctuations, type of rocks, chemical characteristics of the groundwaters, etc.) and represents a novel contribution to the overall knowledge of karst processes with noticeable impacts on human-built construction

Trivariate Burr-III copula with applications to income data

In this work, Bivariate Burr-III copula is extended to the trivariate case. This copula seems to be very general and analytically manageable and it provides an alternative to the commonly employed elliptical copulas (such as the Gaussian or the Stutent's t ones) since they have, roughly, the same number of parameters. Several applications to income and wine data are described in the paper. They show that the Trivariate Burr-III copula is, in general, able to capture the dependence structure implicit in observed trivariate data. Moreover, they show that the third-order interaction parameter results, in some cases, significant at 1\% 1 % significance level while, in other cases, it can be removed from the fitted model. The ability of the Trivariate Burr-III copula in representing the dependence structure implicit in the considered data is compared with the ones of other well known copulas: the Clayton copula, the t copula, and the Skew-t copula. It results that the Trivariate Burr-III copula provides a good fitting and turns out to be the best performer in fitting the considered wine data but, on income data, the best performers are the t and Skew-t copulas. The over-performance of the last two copulas on income data is probably due to their ability in representing right-tail dependence (a kind of dependence that is not taken into account by the Trivariate Burr-III copula)

The effect of renal diet in association with enalapril or benazepril on proteinuria in dogs with proteinuric chronic kidney disease

Treating proteinuria in dogs reduces the progression of chronic kidney disease (CKD); renal diets and angiotensin - converting enzyme (ACE)-inhibitors are cornerstones of treatment. Whether different ACE-inhibitors have distinct kidney protective effects is unknown; it is therefore hypothesized that renal diets and enalapril or benazepril have different beneficial effects in proteinuric CKD dogs. Forty-four dogs with proteinuric CKD (IRIS stages 1-4) were enrolled in the study and were fed renal diet for 30 days. Thereafter, they were randomly assigned to one of 2 groups. Dogs in group A (n=22) received enalapril (0.5 mg/kg, q12h) and in group B (n=22) benazepril (0.5 mg/kg, q24h); in both groups, dogs were fed the same renal diet. After randomization, dogs were monitored for 120 days. Body weight and body condition score (BCS), serum concentrations of creatinine, blood urea nitrogen (BUN), albumin and total proteins, and urine protein-to-creatinine (UPC) ratio were compared at different time-points. After 30 days of renal diet, creatinine, BUN and UPC ratio decreased significantly (p<0.0001). Compared to randomization, body weight, BCS, albumin, total proteins, creatinine and BUN did not vary during follow-up in the 44 dogs and differences between group A and B were not observed. However, the UPC ratio of group A at day 60, 90 and 150 was significantly lower than in group B and compared to randomization (p<0.05). In group B it did not vary overtime. It is concluded that the renal diet is beneficial to decrease creatinine, BUN and UPC ratio in proteinuric CKD dogs. Enalapril further ameliorates proteinuria if administered along with renal diet

Non-invasive methodological approach to detect and characterize high-risk sinkholes in urban cover evaporite karst: Integrated reflection seismics, PS-INSAR, leveling, 3D-GPR and ancillary data. a Ne Italian case study

Sinkholes linked to cover evaporite karst in urban environments still represent a challenge in terms of their clear identification and mapping considering the rehash and man-made structures. In the present research, we have proposed and tested a methodology to identify the subsiding features through an integrated and non-invasive multi-scale approach combining seismic reflection, PS-InSAR (PSI), leveling and full 3D Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR), and thus overpassing the limits of each method. The analysis was conducted in a small village in the Alta Val Tagliamento Valley (Friuli Venezia Giulia region, NE Italy). Here, sinkholes have been reported for a long time as well as the hazards linked to their presence. Within past years, several houses have been demolished and at present many of them are damaged. The PSI investigation allowed the identification of an area with higher vertical velocities; seismic reflection imagined the covered karst bedrock, identifying three depocenters; leveling data presented a downward displacement comparable with PSI results; 3D GPR, applied here for the first time in the study and characterization of sinkholes, defined shallow sinking features. Combining all the obtained results with accurate field observations, we identified and mapped the highest vulnerable zone

Potential Benefits of Remote Working on Urban Mobility and Related Environmental Impacts: Results from a Case Study in Italy

Remote working is increasingly seen as an effective model in several countries in the last decade, mainly thanks to the development of information and communication technologies in support of common daily working tasks. The emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic has represented a pivotal moment for the adoption of remote working in multiple sectors, with positive effects on the environmental impacts caused by the daily commuting of workers. However, due to the fact that pandemic-induced remote working has represented a major forced experiment on a global scale, and that it has often been imposed rather than chosen by employees, workers’ well-being has not always been ensured. This research work presents an analysis of a wide survey of remote workers in public administrations in four different provinces in Italy, with the aim of assessing the main characteristics of the users and the related environmental benefits. Survey data refer to remote workers before COVID-19, thus representing workers who have freely chosen to work from home for different reasons. The results of this work represent a useful tool with which to support the definition of new remote work strategies that could help policy makers reduce a part of the systematic mobility demand. We have also calculated average energy and emission savings to provide useful indicators for a preliminary estimation of the potential environmental benefits of remote working. Considering the entire sample of respondents, workers who would have commuted at least partially by car have saved on average 6 kg of CO2 per day thanks to remote working (with an average round-trip commuting distance of approximately 35 km). The current results will be supplemented by the results of a new survey underway, aimed at evaluating the differences of remote working experiences during the emergency response to COVID-19

Extracellular nanovesicles secreted by human osteosarcoma cells promote angiogenesis

Angiogenesis involves a number of different players among which extracellular nanovesicles (EVs) have recently been proposed as an efficient cargo of pro-angiogenic mediators. Angiogenesis plays a key role in osteosarcoma (OS) development and progression. Acidity is a hallmark of malignancy in a variety of cancers, including sarcomas, as a result of an increased energetic metabolism. The aim of this study was to investigate the role of EVs derived from osteosarcoma cells on angiogenesis and whether extracellular acidity, generated by tumor metabolism, could influence EVs activity. For this purpose, we purified and characterized EVs from OS cells maintained at either acidic or neutral pH. The ability of EVs to induce angiogenesis was assessed in vitro by endothelial cell tube formation and in vivo using chicken chorioallantoic membrane. Our findings demonstrated that EVs derived from osteosarcoma cells maintained either in acidic or neutral conditions induced angiogenesis. The results showed that miRNA and protein content of EVs cargo are correlated with pro-angiogenic activity and this activity is increased by the acidity of tumor microenvironment. This study provides evidence that EVs released by human osteosarcoma cells act as carriers of active angiogenic stimuli that are able to promote endothelial cell functions relevant to angiogenesis

Quantitative analysis of headspace volatile compounds using comprehensive two-dimensional gas chromatography and their contribution to the aroma of Chardonnay wine.

The quantitative determination of volatile compounds of Chardonnay wines using HS-SPME-GC × GC/TOFMS along with the determination of odor activity value (OAV) and relative odor contribution (ROC) of volatiles are reported for the first time. The use of GC × GC/TOFMS for the analysis of Chardonnay wine of Serra Gaucha resulted in the tentative identification of 243 compounds, showing the superior performance of this analytical technique for this specific varietal wine, considering that the number of compounds usually separated by 1D-GC for this type of wine is lower. Furthermore, 42 compounds co-eluted in the first dimension and 34 of them were separated in the second dimension, while the others were resolved by spectral deconvolution (8), which indicates that the conventional 1D-GC/MS may result in misleading results. The calculation of OAV and ROC allowed the determination of the volatile compounds that presented the greater contribution to wine aroma. Ethyl octanoate, ethyl hexanoate, ethyl butanoate, and beta-damascenone showed the highest OAV and ROC values, although other 43 compounds showed also potential to contribute to wine aroma. Figures of merit of the developed method were: accuracies from 92.4 to 102.6%, repeatability from 1.2% to 13.4%, LOD from 0.001 ?g L?1 (ethyl isovalerate and hexanoic acid) to 2.554 ?g L?1 (ethyl 3-hydroxybutanoate), LOQ from 0.003 ?g L?1 (ethyl isovalerate and hexanoic acid) to 7.582 ?g L?1 (ethyl 3-hydroxybutanoate)

Management of acoustic neuromas in the elderly: retrospective study.

The wide availability of gadolinium-enhanced magnetic resonance imaging (MRI-Gd) has led to the discovery of an increasing number of small and less symptomatic acoustic neuromas in elderly patients. We conducted a retrospective study in order to obtain data on outcomes and complications associated with different management strategies that would be useful in establishing a management guideline. We identified 44 patients aged 65 to 77 years with acoustic neuromas who had been managed with either surgery or simple observation with MRI-Gd imaging. Of the entire group, 36 patients had tumors larger than 1 cm, and they underwent surgery (most via the translabyrinthine approach). Complete removal of the tumor was achieved in 34 of these patients (94.4%). At the 1-year follow-up, grade VI facial nerve paralysis was evident in only two of 35 evaluable patients (5.7%). Postsurgical complications occurred in five patients (13.9%), including one death. The remaining eight patients had tumors 1 cm or smaller, and they were managed with periodic MRI-Gd scanning. At the 5-year follow-up, no tumor growth was seen in six of these patients. The other two patients exhibited a tumor growth rate of less than 2 mm per year. No patient in the observation group required surgical intervention

Il benessere a scuola: sviluppo e risultati di un’inchiesta partecipativa

Il contributo presenta i risultati di un’inchiesta tramite questionario sulle condizioni di benessere e disagio a scuola, che ha coinvolto 1389 studentesse e studenti di un Liceo di una città metropolitana dell’Italia settentrionale. Lo strumento d’indagine utilizzato è il prodotto di un processo partecipativo al quale hanno preso parte diverse componenti della comunità scolastica insieme ai ricercatori esterni. Il processo di costruzione ha preso le mosse da un precedente strumento elaborato da un gruppo di studentesse e studenti e ha tenuto conto sia di modelli disponibili nella letteratura di ricerca, sia dei risultati di una indagine esplorativa condotta mediante focus group. Le analisi fattoriali e di scala presentate in questo studio mostrano una struttura multidimensionale del costrutto di benessere che si adatta ai dati raccolti e risulta complessivamente coerente con alcuni studi recenti che ricadono nello stesso ambito. In particolare, il modello proposto considera dieci dimensioni del benessere a scuola, definite come adeguatezza e sicurezza degli spazi fisici, senso di protezione da comportamenti avversi emessi da insegnanti, o da altri studenti, informazione, espressione e partecipazione, rapporto con gli insegnanti, didattica, funzione formativa della valutazione, rapporto con i compagni, soddisfazione per la scelta dell'indirizzo e dell'Istituto. Infine, si presentano alcuni risultati dell’analisi delle differenze significative tra i gruppi secondo l’anno di scolarità, l’occorrenza di debiti formativi e l’identità di genere.This article presents the results of a questionnaire survey on the conditions of well-being and discomfort at school, in which 1389 students from a high school in a large northern Italian city took part. The survey instrument used is the result of a participatory process involving different components of the school community together with external researchers. The construction process started from a previous instrument developed by a group of students and took into account both models available in the research literature and the results of an exploratory study conducted through focus groups. The factor and scale analyses presented in this study show a multidimensional structure of the construct of well-being that fits the data collected and is broadly consistent with a number of recent studies in the same field. In particular, the proposed model considers ten dimensions of wellbeing in school, defined as the adequacy and safety of physical spaces, the feeling of protection from detrimental behaviour by teachers or other students, information, voice and participation, relationship with teachers, teaching methods, formative function of assessment, relationship with peers, and satisfaction with the choice of course and institution. Finally, some results of the analysis of significant differences between the groups according to school year, the occurrence of subject resits, and gender identity are presented