Rock falls impacting railway tracks. Detection analysis through an artificial intelligence camera prototype

During the last few years, several approaches have been proposed to improve early warning systems for managing geological risk due to landslides, where important infrastructures (such as railways, highways, pipelines, and aqueducts) are exposed elements. In this regard, an Artificial intelligence Camera Prototype (AiCP) for real-time monitoring has been integrated in a multisensor monitoring system devoted to rock fall detection. An abandoned limestone quarry was chosen at Acuto (central Italy) as test-site for verifying the reliability of the integratedmonitoring system. A portion of jointed rockmass, with dimensions suitable for optical monitoring, was instrumented by extensometers. One meter of railway track was used as a target for fallen blocks and a weather station was installed nearby. Main goals of the test were (i) evaluating the reliability of the AiCP and (ii) detecting rock blocks that reach the railway track by the AiCP. At this aim, several experiments were carried out by throwing rock blocks over the railway track. During these experiments, the AiCP detected the blocks and automatically transmitted an alarm signal

Evaluation of the effects of changes in regulatory policies on consumers perception: the case of designations of origin in the wine common market organisation

The paper analyses how different aspects connected with regulations can influence the consumers’ quality perception and the value that consumers attribute to the wine sector products. In particular, aspects concerning labelling and presentation of designations of origin, which, in turn, mirror different regulations of production methods, are considered. Consumers’ preference can allow enterprises to complying with more restrictive rules and sustain higher costs for differentiate their products and achieve higher quality. When choosing a product, consumers do not evaluate each single quality factor but the product as a whole, therefore the analysis has to be done with a methodology considering both the combination of all characteristics of the product, and the contribution of every factor to the creation of value for consumers. For this reason the value that consumers attribute to different characteristics is evaluated through an experimental economic analysis applying the method of the Conjoint analysis.Conjoint analysis, designations of origin, wine sector regulation, consumer perception, Agricultural and Food Policy, Q 13, Q 18,

Investigating rock mass failure precursors using a multi-sensor monitoring system. Preliminary results from a test-site (Acuto, Italy)

In the last few years, several approaches and methods have been proposed to improve early warning systems for managing risks due to rapid slope failures where important infrastructures are the main exposed elements. To this aim, a multi-sensor monitoring system has been installed in an abandoned quarry at Acuto (central Italy) to realise a natural-scale test site for detecting rock-falls from a cliff slope. The installed multi-sensor monitoring system consists of: i) two weather stations; ii) optical cam (Smart Camera) connected to an Artificial Intelligence (AI) system; iii) stress- strain geotechnical system; iv) seismic monitoring device and nano-seismic array for detecting microseismic events on the cliff slope. The main objective of the experiment at this test site is to investigate precursors of rock mass failures by coupling remote and local sensors. The integrated monitoring system is devoted to record strain rates of rock mass joints, capturing their variations as an effect of forcing actions, which are the temperature, the rainfalls and the wind velocity and direction. The preliminary tests demonstrate that the data analysis methods allowed the identification of external destabilizing actions responsible for strain effects on rock joints. More in particular, it was observed that the temperature variations play a significant role for detectable strains of rock mass joints. The preliminary results obtained so far encourage further experiments

Upgrade of the CEDIT database of earthquake-induced ground effects in Italy

The database related to the Italian Catalogue of EarthquakeInduced Ground Failures (CEDIT), was recently upgraded and updated to 2017 in the frame of a work-in-progress focused on the following issues: i) reorganization of the geo-database architecture; ii) revision of the earthquake parameters from the CFTI5 e CPTI15 catalogues by INGV; ii) addition of new data on effects induced by earthquakes occurred from 2009 to 2017; iv) attribution of macroseismic intensity value to each effect site, according to the CFTI5 e CPTI15 catalogues by INGV. The revised CEDIT database aims at achieving: i) the optimization of the CEDIT catalogue in order to increase its usefulness for both Public Institutions and individual users; ii) a new architecture of the geo-database in view of a future implementation of the online catalogue which implies its usability via web-app also to support post-event detection and surveying activities. Here we illustrate the new geo-database design and discuss the statistics that can be derived from the updated database. Statistical analysis was carried out on the data recorded in the last update of CEDIT to 2017 and compared with the analysis of the previous update outline that: - the most represented ground effects are the landslides with a percentage of 55% followed by ground cracks with a percentage of 23%; - the MCS intensity (IMCS) distribution of the effect sites shows a maximum in correspondence of the IMCS class 8 even if a second frequency peak appears in the IMCS class 7 only for surface faulting effects; - the distribution of the effects according to the epicentral distance shows a decrease for all the typologies of induced ground effects with increasing epicentral distance

Tourism transition in peripheral rural areas: Theories, issues and strategies

This article examines the relationship between “rural peripherality” and “tourism transition” to describe the ongoing transformations within the tourist supply in rural areas, highlighting the importance these concepts are acquiring in both the theoretical debate and the formation of policies. Based on the classification of peripheral areas provided by the Italian Strategy for Inner Areas the authors have undertaken a detailed statistical analysis at the municipality level, considering tourism as an important driver of socio-economical change. A model of governance based on “transition management” is put forward as a practical tool to guide these processes. A case study conducted through participatory action-research offered the opportunity to overcome existing governance practices and experiment with more adaptive methods to manage the transition

Agroturismo e orientação aos circuitos curtos de comercialização dos alimentos orgânicos : estudo do caso "acolhida na colônia"

Dissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Centro de Ciências Agrárias, Programa de Pós-Graduação em Agroecossistemas, Florianópolis, 2016.Esta pesquisa trata da orientação aos canais de venda dos produtos orgânicos, com particular atenção à venda direta na propriedade e a outras formas de circuitos curtos de comercialização praticadas pelos agricultores familiares da associação de agroturismo ?Acolhida na Colônia?, no estado de Santa Catarina, Brasil. As motivações e as problemáticas encontradas na fase de comercialização pelas famílias que oferecem serviços agroturísticos foram mapeadas por entrevistas e grupo focal e analisadas a partir de estatísticas descritivas e multivariadas, com a finalidade de tipificar o perfil de relação mercantil e de orientação ao mercado dos agricultores familiares que visam articular o agroturismo com a oferta de produtos orgânicos. O conhecimento existente sobre o tema pesquisado foi aprofundado e atualizado com base nos resultados da pesquisa de campo, sob o pressuposto de que os três conceitos analisados (marketing para agricultura familiar, circuitos curtos de comercialização e agroturismo) estão fortemente ligados uns aos outros pela dinâmica da relação entre produtores e consumidores de produtos orgânicos. Ferramentas de marketing podem ser usadas por agricultores familiares da AC que precisam inovar e melhorar o relacionamento com o mercado local, escolhendo as estratégias e os canais de comercialização mais adequados para integrar com sucesso a oferta de serviços de agroturismo com a de produtos orgânicos. Os resultados da análise multivariada aplicada aos dados obtidos por meio dos 111 questionários válidos coletados entre os 120 agricultores familiares de AC, confirmados também pelas respostas obtidas no grupo focal realizado em Santa Rosa de Lima com os agricultores da AC, permitiram identificar três diferentes perfis de orientação ao mercado. Esses resultados empíricos, assim como conhecimento direto das problemáticas e dificuldades dos agricultores e das suas esperanças e expectativas em relação ao relacionamento com o mercado dos orgânicos, constituem a base para a individuação de estratégias para desenvolver, em particular por meio dos circuitos curtos de comercialização, a capacidade da AC de melhorar o escoamento das produções orgânicas dos seus associados.Abstract : This research investigates the orientation of the sales channels for organic products, with special attention to direct sales at on the farm and other forms of short commercialization supply chains used by the family farmers of the "Acolhida na Colônia" agro-tourism association (AC) in the state of Santa Catarina (SC), Brazil.The investigation method is based on qualitative - focus group with the CA farmers - and descriptive and multivariate statistics of 111 questionnaires to the farmers. The results of the multivariate analysis are confirmed by the responses in the Santa Rosa de Lima Focus Group, allowing for the definition of three different market-orientation profiles of the 111 family farmers.The issue of establishing an effective and efficient producer-consumer relationship for those farmers who want to combine agro-tourism and trading of organic products has been investigated focusing on three interconnected concepts: family farming marketing, short marketing circuits and agro-tourism. The results obtained show that the problems met by the AC farmers in the trading of the organic products can be solved through more effective strategies of short marketing circuits to improve the connection between farmers and consumers

Factors Influencing Consumers’ Attitude Towards Biopreservatives

Biopreservatives have received considerable attention in recent years as natural alternatives to synthetic preservatives. This seems to be a response to an increased demand for natural and organic foods. This study investigates the potential market for products enriched with biopreservatives in Italy. Data were collected from a sample of Italian consumers (N = 479) using a web‐based survey. The main results indicate that 64% of respondents declared themselves to be willing to consume biopreservatives only if they replaced synthetic preservatives. Principal component analysis (PCA) was applied to reduce the number of variables. The factorial scores of the components obtained from PCA were used for a Cluster Analysis related to consumers’ perceptions about biopreservatives. Moreover, the survey highlights that the respondents had positive opinions about biopreservatives, although they showed difficulty in perceiving the exact meaning of the term. The study could provide useful implications for food manufacturers and facilitate the design of marketing strategies for foods enriched with biopreservative

Curcumin blocks autophagy and activates apoptosis of malignant mesothelioma cell lines and increases the survival of mice intraperitoneally transplanted with a malignant mesothelioma cell line

Malignant mesothelioma (MM) is a primary tumor arising from the serous membranes. The resistance of MM patients to conventional therapies, and the poor patients' survival, encouraged the identification of molecular targets for MM treatment. Curcumin (CUR) is a "multifunctional drug". We explored the in vitro effects of CUR on cell proliferation, cell cycle regulation, pro-survival signaling pathways, apoptosis, autophagy of human (MM-B1, H-Meso-1, MM-F1), and mouse (#40a) MM cells. In addition, we evaluated the in vivo anti-tumor activities of CUR in C57BL/6 mice intraperitoneally transplanted with #40a cells forming ascites.CUR in vitro inhibited MM cells survival in a dose- and time-dependent manner and increased reactive oxygen species'intracellular production and induced DNA damage. CUR triggered autophagic flux, but the process was then blocked and was coincident with caspase 8 activation which activates apoptosis. CUR-mediated apoptosis was supported by the increase of Bax/Bcl-2 ratio, increase of p53 expression, activation of caspase 9, cleavage of PARP-1, increase of the percentage of cells in the sub G1 phase which was reduced (MM-F1 and #40a) or abolished (MM-B1 and H-Meso-1) after MM cells incubation with the apoptosis inhibitor Z-VAD-FMK. CUR treatment stimulated the phosphorylation of ERK1/2 and p38 MAPK, inhibited that of p54 JNK and AKT, increased c-Jun expression and phosphorylation and prevented NF-κB nuclear translocation. Intraperitoneal administration of CUR increased the median survival of C57BL/6 mice intraperitoneally transplanted with #40a cells and reduced the risk of developing tumors. Our findings may have important implications for the design of MM treatment using CUR