Carbon sequestration in a Mediterranean olive orchard managed sustainably over a 20-year period

Olive is a widespread crop within Mediterranean area and Italy is one of the biggest producer of olives and oil in the world. From an environmental point of view, centered on carbon (C) sequestration, managing olive orchards sustainably is an urgent and actual issue. This trial was done in a 2-ha olive orchard (Olea europaea L., cv. ‘Maiatica’; 70-year-old plants, with a distance of 8 × 8 m and NE orientation) located in Ferrandina (Southern Italy, Basilicata region; N 40°29’; E 16°28’). The soil is a sandy loam (Haplic Calcisol - WRB), with a mean bulk density of 1.30 g cm–3 and sediment as parental material. The major landform is plain, the slope form is classified as convex-straight and the gradient class as gently sloping (2-5%). Half of the orchard has been managed using sustainable agricultural practices (sustainable management, Sung) for 20 years (2000-2020). Trees were drip-irrigated from March to October with urban wastewater. A light pruning was carried out every year during winter. The soil was permanently covered by spontaneous self-seeding weeds, mowed twice a year. Cover crop residues and prunings were shredded and left along the row as mulch. The other half of the orchard was kept as ‘control’ plot. It was rainfed and conducted with a locally conventional management (Cmng), according to the practices usually adopted by farmers. The Cmng was managed by tillage performed 2-3 times per year to control weeds. Intensive pruning was carried out every two years, but pruned residues were removed from the orchard. A mineral fertilization was carried out once per year, during the fruit set and pit hardening phase (early spring). The average value (n = 5; 0-100 cm soil depth) of baseline soil organic carbon (SOC) stock (related to the Cmng) in the 20-year period was 4.79 t SOC ha–1, with an average additional SOC storage potential because of the adoption of the Smng of 0.15 t SOC ha–1 yr–1, and a SOC stock after 20 years of Smng of 7.75 t SOC ha–1 yr–1. In the Smng system, soil acted as a significant sink for C, especially due to the supplies of the organic resources internal to the system. The Smng system, made up of mature olive trees, was also able to fix in its aboveground and belowground components, a > 2-times higher total amount of C than the Cmng. Spontaneous vegetation was the most important pool, sequestering about 35% of the total fixed C. Also pruning material had a substantial importance in C fixation. Emissions of CO2 eq per kg of olives, calculated according to the Life Cycle Assessment (LCA), were 0.08 kg in the Smng system and 0.11 kg in the Cmng system. Besides C sequestration, the application of the Smng markedly improved physical, chemical, and biological soil fertility, with benefits on plants and production. The application of a sustainable soil and plant management makes olive growing a multifunctional rural activity, not only aimed at production, but including many other objectives, such as environmental, landscaping cultural, social and recreational

Sensing Sound And Space:Auditory And Visual Spatial ImpressionIn Three Auditoria

In some contexts, the experience of sound and space are often considered as two unrelated experiences. In an auditorium, the senses of hearing and seeing are not necessary unrelated. This thesis proposes that there is a sensorial relationship between sound and space in the context of symphonic concert halls. Through a study of three auditoria, this thesis explores the relationship, and the degree of correspondence and interaction between auditory and visual spatial impression. It begins by exploring the concepts of auditory and visual spatial impression in relation with auditorium acoustics and architectural design. In auditorium acoustics, a number of terms are used to describe auditory spatial impression, such as 'spaciousness,' 'envelopment,' and 'intimacy.' These terms have connotations beyond the auditory. The thesis suggests that they may also be used to describe visual spatial impression in auditoria. Through textual analyses, the thesis finds that the auditory and visual terms do not always relate to the same physical characteristics of auditoria and can conflict with one another. Hence, it is apparent that further subjective analyses of auditory and spatial impression are needed. Three chapters in this thesis are devoted to auditory and visual subjective experiments. Their purpose is to explore the degree of correspondence or contrast, and interaction between auditory and visual spatial impression. The degree of correspondence and contrast between auditory and visual spatial impression appear to vary between auditoria and within auditoria. The relationship between auditory and visual spatial impression appear to be both necessary and arbitrary, and the degree of interaction between them appear to be strong in some cases and weak in other. From the findings, this thesis suggests that the degree of correspondence or contrast, and interaction between auditory and visual spatial impression could be used to create an audiovisual experience that suit specific musical events. Concert auditoria are culturally and artistically unique spaces. Hence, consideration must be taken to understand the relationships between, and intentions of the acoustical and architectural designs, music and architecture, for a successful and creative collaboration between designers - since the ultimate goal is to create an extraordinary audiovisual experience in a concert hall

A new Monte Carlo muon generator for cosmic-ray muon applications

Cosmic rays, thanks to their ubiquity and high penetration capability, have been successfully used in scientific research ever since their discovery. As soon as their knowledge improved, applications in the civil/environmental field were also developed: muon radiography (or muography, based on the flux attenuation) and muon tomography (based on the scattering angle) have been used to study the inner structure of volcanoes, to seek hidden rooms in Egyptian pyramids, to search for heavy metals in containers, and so on. And besides these imaging techniques, cosmic ray muons are also widely used for detector testing and alignment practically in every Nuclear Physics or Particle Physics experiment. Since most of these applications are sensitive to the angular and momentum distribution of cosmic muons, an accurate modelling of these distributions is a key feature for any generation tool conceived to simulate the cosmic muon flux. This can make the generator quite time-consuming, which is a strong limit when one needs to reach high statistics or to study large structures. A new Monte Carlo generator for cosmic-ray muons, named Efficient COsmic MUon Generator (EcoMug for short), especially designed to be fast (≳ 10^5 muons generated per second on a standard machine) without losing accuracy, is presented here. It is written as a header-only C++11 library, ready to be integrated into whatever C++ code, in particular C++ code based on Geant4 simulation tool. By default, EcoMug relies on a simple and effective parametrisation of the experimental data of cosmic ray differential flux at sea level, taken from the literature, but the library is written in such a way that every user can easily replace it with his own user-defined parametrisation. Unlike other tools, EcoMug is able to generate muons from different kind of surfaces (plane, cylinder and half-sphere), while keeping the correct angular and momentum distribution of generated tracks inside a fiducial volume. This allows to optimise the generation surface according to the system under study, and leads to a further improvement of the overall simulation efficiency. In this contribution we will present the main features of EcoMug, starting from its mathematical foundation, and eventually showing some interesting applications

Constraining the mass of the planet(s) sculpting a disk cavity. The intriguing case of 2MASS J16042165-2130284

The large cavities observed in the dust and gas distributions of transition disks may be explained by planet-disk interactions. At ~145 pc, 2MASS J16042165-2130284 (J1604) is a 5-12 Myr old transitional disk with different gap sizes in the mm- and $\mu$m-sized dust distributions (outer edges at ~79 and at ~63 au, respectively). Its $^{12}$CO emission shows a ~30 au cavity. This radial structure suggests that giant planets are sculpting this disk. We aim to constrain the masses and locations of plausible giant planets around J1604. We observed J1604 with the Spectro-Polarimetric High-contrast Exoplanet REsearch (SPHERE) at the Very Large Telescope (VLT), in IRDIFS\_EXT, pupil-stabilized mode, obtaining YJH- band images with the integral field spectrograph (IFS) and K1K2-band images with the Infra-Red Dual-beam Imager and Spectrograph (IRDIS). The dataset was processed exploiting the angular differential imaging (ADI) technique with high-contrast algorithms. Our observations reach a contrast of $\Delta K, YH$ ~12 mag from 0.15" to 0.80" (~22 to 115 au), but no planet candidate is detected. The disk is directly imaged in scattered light at all bands from Y to K, and it shows a red color. This indicates that the dust particles in the disk surface are mainly $\gtrsim0.3\,\mu$m-sized grains. We confirm the sharp dip/decrement in scattered light in agreement with polarized light observations. Comparing our images with a radiative transfer model we argue that the southern side of the disk is most likely the nearest. This work represents the deepest search yet for companions around J1604. We reach a mass sensitivity of $\gtrsim 2-3M_{Jup}$ from ~22 to ~115 au according to a hot start scenario. We propose that a brown dwarf orbiting inside of ~15 au and additional Jovian planets at larger radii could account for the observed properties of J1604 while explaining our lack of detection.Comment: 10 pages, 7 Figures. Accepted for publication in A&A . Abridged abstrac

TASTE. III. A homogeneous study of transit time variations in WASP-3b

The TASTE project is searching for low-mass planets with the Transit Timing Variation (TTV) technique, by gathering high-precision, short-cadence light curves for a selected sample of transiting exoplanets. It has been claimed that the "hot Jupiter" WASP-3b could be perturbed by a second planet. Presenting eleven new light curves (secured at the IAC80 and UDEM telescopes) and re-analyzing thirty-eight archival light curves in a homogeneous way, we show that new data do not confirm the previously claimed TTV signal. However, we bring evidence that measurements are not consistent with a constant orbital period, though no significant periodicity can be detected. Additional dynamical modeling and follow-up observations are planned to constrain the properties of the perturber or to put upper limits to it. We provide a refined ephemeris for WASP-3b and improved orbital/physical parameters. A contact eclipsing binary, serendipitously discovered among field stars, is reported here for the first time.Comment: 10 pages, 6 figures, 4 tables; accepted for publication in A&

Tako-Tsubo cardiomyopathy in an older woman with hyperkinetic delirium

Tako-Tsubo syndrome is cardiological condition, mainly affecting post-menopausal women, that mimics an acute heart attack, because a similar clinical presentation, ECG changes and altered laboratory tests. There is general consensus that the common etiology is a sudden and strong emotional or physical stress. We report here the case of 80-yearold woman who developed a Tako-Tsubo syndrome during an episode of hyperkinetic delirium. Delirium is an acute, transient, usually reversible neuropsychiatric syndrome, considered a serious and stressful condition in older patients admitted to both medical and surgical setting. This clinical case expands our knowledge on the negative consequence of delirium in hospitalized patients and describes an additional risk factor for Tako-Tsubo syndrome in older people

Reducción del consumo eléctrico debido a climatización en un salón de un edificio educativo del NEA

La sociedad actual demanda condiciones de confort que permitan desarrollar actividades con elevada productividad, en el NEA alcanzar las condiciones apropiadas de temperatura y humedad en edificios antiguos implica un excesivo consumo de energía eléctrica. Se presenta la simulación computacional mediante el software Energy Plus del comportamiento térmico de un aula del edificio de la Facultad Regional Resistencia de la Universidad Tecnológica Nacional. Se validan los resultados de la simulación con datos experimentales de temperatura interior para idénticas condiciones exteriores de radiación solar y temperatura. Se obtiene la carga térmica instantánea y la disminución potencial de consumo de energía eléctrica destinada a la climatización para diferentes casos de rehabilitación térmica del salón. Se verifica la exactitud del modelo confrontando los resultados de la simulación con los datos internos medidos en el aula. Se demuestra también la capacidad del software como herramienta para mejorar la eficiencia energética de edificios y garantizar las condiciones de confort.Today’s society demands high comfort conditions to carry out activities with high productivity, in the Argentine Northeast achieving the appropriate conditions of temperature and humidity in old buildings involves excessive power consumption. It is presented the computer simulation by the Energy Plus software about thermal behavior of a classroom in the building of the Facultad Regional Resistencia of the Universidad Tecnológica Nacional. The simulation results are validated with measured data of indoor temperature for the same exterior conditions of solar radiation and temperature. Is obtained the instantaneous thermal charge and the decrease of potential consumption of electricity for air conditioning in different cases of thermal rehabilitation. The accuracy of the model is verified by comparing the simulation results with internal data measured in the classroom. The ability of the software as a tool to improve the energy efficiency of buildings and ensure comfort conditions is also demonstrated.Tema 8: Energías renovables, modelización y simulación.Facultad de Arquitectura y Urbanism

Reducción del consumo eléctrico debido a climatización en un salón de un edificio educativo del NEA

La sociedad actual demanda condiciones de confort que permitan desarrollar actividades con elevada productividad, en el NEA alcanzar las condiciones apropiadas de temperatura y humedad en edificios antiguos implica un excesivo consumo de energía eléctrica. Se presenta la simulación computacional mediante el software Energy Plus del comportamiento térmico de un aula del edificio de la Facultad Regional Resistencia de la Universidad Tecnológica Nacional. Se validan los resultados de la simulación con datos experimentales de temperatura interior para idénticas condiciones exteriores de radiación solar y temperatura. Se obtiene la carga térmica instantánea y la disminución potencial de consumo de energía eléctrica destinada a la climatización para diferentes casos de rehabilitación térmica del salón. Se verifica la exactitud del modelo confrontando los resultados de la simulación con los datos internos medidos en el aula. Se demuestra también la capacidad del software como herramienta para mejorar la eficiencia energética de edificios y garantizar las condiciones de confort.Today’s society demands high comfort conditions to carry out activities with high productivity, in the Argentine Northeast achieving the appropriate conditions of temperature and humidity in old buildings involves excessive power consumption. It is presented the computer simulation by the Energy Plus software about thermal behavior of a classroom in the building of the Facultad Regional Resistencia of the Universidad Tecnológica Nacional. The simulation results are validated with measured data of indoor temperature for the same exterior conditions of solar radiation and temperature. Is obtained the instantaneous thermal charge and the decrease of potential consumption of electricity for air conditioning in different cases of thermal rehabilitation. The accuracy of the model is verified by comparing the simulation results with internal data measured in the classroom. The ability of the software as a tool to improve the energy efficiency of buildings and ensure comfort conditions is also demonstrated.Tema 8: Energías renovables, modelización y simulación.Facultad de Arquitectura y Urbanism