Digital and Strategic Innovation for Alpine Health Tourism

This open access book presents a set of practical tools and collaborative solutions in multi-disciplinary settings to foster the Alpine Space health tourism industry’s innovation and competitiveness. The proposed solutions emerge as the result of the synergy among health, environment, tourism, digital, policy and strategy professionals. The approach underlines the pivotal role of a sustainable and ecomedical use of Alpine natural resources for health tourism destinations, and highlights the need of integrating aspects of natural resources’ healing effects, a shared knowledge of Alpine assets through digital solutions, and frames strategic approaches for the long-term development of the sector. The volume exploits the results of the three-years long EU research project HEALPS 2, which involved several stakeholders from the health tourism, healthcare and sustainable tourism industries. This book is relevant for health tourism destinations and facilities (hotels, clinics, wellness and spa companies), regional and local authorities (policy makers), business support organizations, researchers involved in digital healthcare and geoinformatics

A Telemetry-driven Approach to Simulate Data-intensive Manufacturing Processes

Abstract Telemetry enables the collection of data from remote points to support monitoring, analysis and visualization. It is largely adopted in Formula One car racing, where streams of live data collected from hundreds of sensors installed on car components are transmitted to the pitwall to be used as input of real-time car performance simulations. The aim of this paper is to evaluate the potential of a telemetry-driven approach in a manufacturing environment, where researchers are still looking for efficient methods to perform valuable simulations of the production processes on the basis of real data coming from the factory. The telemetry could contribute to the implementation of a virtual image of the real factory, which in turn could be used to simulate the factory performance, allowing to predict failures or investigate problems, and to reduce costly downtime. This study addresses in particular the efforts to combine and adapt methods and techniques borrowed from the field of Formula One car racing. Moreover, the investigation of the exploitation possibilities of the factory telemetry is paired with the design of a software application supporting this technology, starting from the elicitation and specification of the functional requirements

Optimized design of wastewater stream treatment processes by membrane technologies

Wastewater treatment by membrane technologies is gaining more and more importance and the relevant market is increasing. This trend is mainly justified by novel and high-performance membrane materials, a wider number of successful applications by membrane technologies and the progressive reduction of the investment and operating costs. The main drawback of membrane technology is membrane fouling, that reduces the membrane performances along the time and leads to a premature substitution of the membrane modules. In the last years, a better understanding of the fouling phenomena has sensibly increased the confidence in this technology. This is especially true for wastewater treatment processes based on membranes. In this case low operating costs are mandatory, thus the membrane modules should not be frequently replaced. This work briefly covers the theory and measurement procedures of the critical, threshold and boundary flux, with the aim of process optimization and control design. The goal is to operate membranes modules by avoiding irreversible fouling for a long period of time (several years). The importance of specific pretreatment processes, such as flocculation and photocatalysis, adopted to reduce fouling phenomena will be also discussed. Moreover, the design of advanced control systems for batch membrane and some examples of wastewater treatment (olive mill wastewater and the effluents from the tannery industry) will be reported

Report on the Verification of the Performance of 1507, 59122, MON 810 and NK603 Event-specific PCR-based Methods applied to DNA extracted from Stack Maize 1507 x 59122 x MON 810 x NK603

An application was submitted by Pioneer Overseas Corporation to request the authorization of the genetically modified maize stack 1507 x 59122 x MON 810 x NK603, resistant against certain lepidopteran pests, protected against corn rootworm larvae, and glufosinate-ammonium and glyphosate tolerant, and all sub-combinations of the individual events as present in the segregating progeny, for food and feed uses, and import and processing, in accordance with articles 5 and 17 of Regulation (EC) N° 1829/2003 GM Food and GM Feed. The unique identifier assigned to 1507 x 59122 x MON 810 x NK603 maize is DAS-Ø15Ø7-1xDAS-59122-7xMON-ØØ81Ø-6xMON-ØØ6Ø3-6. The genetically modified maize line 1507 x 59122 x MON 810 x NK603 has been obtained by conventional crossing of four genetically modified single maize events: 1507, 59122, MON 810 and NK603 without any new genetic modification. The EU-RL GMFF has previously validated, and declared fit for purpose, the detection methods for the single events 1507, 59122, MON 810 and NK603 (see: http://gmo-crl.jrc.ec.europa.eu/statusofdoss.htm). In line with the approach defined by the ENGL (http://gmo-crl.jrc.ec.europa.eu/doc/Min_Perf_Requirements_Analytical_methods.pdf) the EU-RL GMFF therefore has carried out only an in-house verification of the performance of each validated method when applied to DNA extracted from 1507 x 59122 x MON 810 x NK603. The herewith reported in-house verification study lead to the conclusion that the individual methods meet the ENGL performance criteria also when applied to DNA extracted from the GM maize stack 1507 x 59122 x MON 810 x NK603.JRC.I.3-Molecular Biology and Genomic

Report on the Verification of the Performance of Bt11, MIR162, 1507 and GA21 Event-specific Methods on the Bt11 x MIR162 x 1507 x GA21 Maize Using Real-time PCR

An application was submitted by Syngenta Crop Protection AG to request the authorisation of genetically modified Bt11 x MIR162 x 1507 x GA21 maize (tolerant to herbicides containing glufosinate ammonium and glyphosate and resistant to important lepidoptera maize pests) and all sub-combinations of the individual events as present in the segregating progeny, for food and feed uses, and import and processing, in accordance with articles 5 and 17 of Regulation (EC) N° 1829/2003 GM Food and GM Feed (1). The unique identifier assigned to Bt11 x MIR162 x 1507 x GA21 maize is SYN-BTØ11-1 x SYN-IR162-4 x DAS-Ø15Ø7-1 x MON-ØØØ21-9. Bt11 x MIR162 x 1507 x GA21 maize has been obtained by conventional crossing between four genetically modified maize events: Bt11, MIR162, 1507 and GA21. No new genetic modification was used for the development of Bt11 x MIR162 x 1507 x GA21 maize. The EU-RL GMFF has previously validated individually, and declared fit for purpose, the detection methods for the single events Bt11, MIR162, 1507, GA21 and has published the corresponding reports http://gmo-crl.jrc.ec.europa.eu/StatusOfDossiers.aspx; therefore, in line with the approach defined by the ENGL (Annex 1, http://gmo-crl.jrc.ec.europa.eu/doc/Min_Perf_Requirements_Analytical_methods.pdf) the EU-RL GMFF has carried out only an in-house verification of the performance of each validated method when applied to DNA extracted from Bt11 x MIR162 x 1507 x GA21. The results of the in-house verification study were evaluated with reference to ENGL requirements and to the validation results on the individual events; as a result, the EU-RL GMFF concludes that the individual methods meet the ENGL criteria and can also be applied to Bt11 x MIR162 x 1507 x GA21 maize. This report is published at http://gmo-crl.jrc.ec.europa.eu/StatusOfDossiers.aspx.JRC.I.3-Molecular Biology and Genomic

Event-specific Method for the Quantification of Soybean DAS-68416-4 Using Real-time PCR: Validation report

In line with its mandate the European Union Reference Laboratory for GM Food and Feed (EU RL GMFF), in collaboration with the European Network of GMO Laboratories (ENGL), has validated an event-specific polymerase chain reaction (PCR) method for detecting and quantifying soybean event DAS-68416-4 (unique identifier DAS-68416-4). The validation study was conducted according to the EU-RL GMFF validation procedure (http://gmo-crl.jrc.ec.europa.eu/guidancedocs.htm) and internationally accepted guidelines. In accordance with current EU legislation , Dow AgroSciences LLC provided the detection method and the positive and negative control samples (genomic DNA extracted from soybean kernels harbouring the DAS-68416-4 event as positive control DNA, genomic DNA extracted from conventional soybean kernels as negative control DNA). The EU-RL GMFF prepared the validation samples (calibration samples and blind samples at different GM percentage [DNA/DNA]), organised an international collaborative study and analysed the results. The study confirms that the method meets the method performance requirements as established by the EU-RL GMFF and the ENGL and according to Annex I-2.C.2 to Regulation (EC) No 641/2004 and it fulfils the analytical requirements of Regulation (EU) No 619/2011JRC.I.3-Molecular Biology and Genomic

First record of the North American cryptic invader Ferrissia fragilis (Tryon, 1863) (Mollusca: Gastropoda: Planorbidae) in the Middle East

Some gastropod specimens belonging to the planorbid genus Ferrissia were recently collected in Lebanon and in Iraq, where the autochthonous species Ferrissia clessiniana (Jickeli, 1882) is supposed to occur. The molecular identification of collected specimens proved that they belong to the allochthonous species Ferrissia fragilis (Tryon, 1863), the protagonist of a dramatic cryptic invasion which is of interest to the whole of Eurasia. These findings cast further doubts on the actual existence of autochthonous Ferrissia species in the Palaearctic. The need for a molecular characterisation of the topotypical population of F. clessiniana, and for a revision of the Palaearctic Ferrissia species, is stressed