Digital 3D reconstruction as a research environment in art and architecture history: uncertainty classification and visualisation

The dissertation addresses the still not solved challenges concerned with the source-based digital 3D reconstruction, visualisation and documentation in the domain of archaeology, art and architecture history. The emerging BIM methodology and the exchange data format IFC are changing the way of collaboration, visualisation and documentation in the planning, construction and facility management process. The introduction and development of the Semantic Web (Web 3.0), spreading the idea of structured, formalised and linked data, offers semantically enriched human- and machine-readable data. In contrast to civil engineering and cultural heritage, academic object-oriented disciplines, like archaeology, art and architecture history, are acting as outside spectators. Since the 1990s, it has been argued that a 3D model is not likely to be considered a scientific reconstruction unless it is grounded on accurate documentation and visualisation. However, these standards are still missing and the validation of the outcomes is not fulfilled. Meanwhile, the digital research data remain ephemeral and continue to fill the growing digital cemeteries. This study focuses, therefore, on the evaluation of the source-based digital 3D reconstructions and, especially, on uncertainty assessment in the case of hypothetical reconstructions of destroyed or never built artefacts according to scientific principles, making the models shareable and reusable by a potentially wide audience. The work initially focuses on terminology and on the definition of a workflow especially related to the classification and visualisation of uncertainty. The workflow is then applied to specific cases of 3D models uploaded to the DFG repository of the AI Mainz. In this way, the available methods of documenting, visualising and communicating uncertainty are analysed. In the end, this process will lead to a validation or a correction of the workflow and the initial assumptions, but also (dealing with different hypotheses) to a better definition of the levels of uncertainty.

Project Financing nelle Infrastrutture del Trasporto

L’elaborato ha avuto ad oggetto l’analisi delle sofisticate soluzioni normative proposte dall’ordinamento nazionale in relazione all’evoluzione della finanza di progetto. In particolare, è stata condotto un dettagliato studio delle fasi che compongono il project financing, nonché dei soggetti che, a diverso titolo e ragione, vi partecipano. L’elaborato contiene, poi, recenti esempi concreti di project financing nelle infrastrutture primarie (autostrade) tra cui il progetto di costruzione e la successiva gestione dell’autostrada regionale Medio Padana veneta, dell’autostrada regionale Cispadana, e dell’autostrada “Nogara-mare”. L’ultimo parte della tesi è stata infine incentrata sull’analisi delle più recenti pronunce giurisprudenziali in materia di project financing. In particolare, si ha avuto modo di analizzare il fenomeno dello jus poenitendi dell’amministrazione aggiudicatrice, nonché, più in generale gli eventi che possono negativamente incidere sulla finanza di progetto (mancata aggiudicazione, risoluzione del contratto di gestione, ecc.).

Trees: radiocarbon and dendrochronology - together for the Resolution project

The year 14,226 BP marks an important border in the actual radiocarbon (14C) calibration curve: the high resolution and precision characterising the first part (0 – 14,226 BP) of the curve are due to the potential represented by tree-ring datasets, which directly provide the atmospheric 14C content at the time of tree-rings formation with high resolution. They systematically decrease going back in time, where only a few floating tree-ring chronologies alternate to other low-resolution records. The lack of resolution in the dating procedure before 14,226 years BP leads to significant issues in the interpretation and untangling of tricky facts of our past, in the field of Human Evolution. Research on sub-fossil trees and the construction of new Glacial tree-ring chronologies can significantly improve the radiocarbon dating in terms of temporal resolution and precision until 55,000 years BP to clear puzzles in the Human Evolution history. In this thesis, the dendrochronological study, the radiocarbon dating and the extrapolation of environmental and climate information from sub-fossil trees found on the Portugal foreshore, remnants of a Glacial lagoonal forest, are presented. The careful sampling, the dendrochronological measurements and cross-dating, the application of the most suitable cellulose extraction protocol and the most advanced technologies of the MICADAS system at ETH-Zurich, led to the construction of a new 220-years long tree-ring site chronology and to high resolution, highly reliable and with a tight error range radiocarbon ages. At the moment, it results impossible to absolutely date this radiocarbon sequence by the comparison of Δ14C of the trees and 10 Be fluctuations from the ice-cores. For this reason, tree growth analysis, comparisons with a living pine stand and forest-fires history reconstruction have made it possible to hypothesize site and climate characteristics useful to constrain the positioning in time of the obtained radiocarbon sequence.

Monitoring of New Psychoactive Substances in the hair of patients with a history of addiction. Evaluation of the public health impact.

Introduction. The term New Psychoactive Substances (NPS) encompasses a broad category of drugs which have become available on the market in recent years and whose illicit use for recreational purposes has recently exploded. The analysis of NPS usually requires mass spectrometry based techniques. The aim of our study was to define the preva-lence of NPS consumption in patients with a history of drug addiction followed by Public Services for Pathological Addictions, with the purpose of highlighting the effective presence of NPS within the area of Bologna and evaluating their association with classical drugs of abuse (DOA). Materials and methods. Sustained by literature, a multi-analyte UHPLC-MS/MS method for the identification of 127 NPS (phenethylamines, arylcyclohexylamines, synthetic opioids, tryptamines, synthetic cannabinoids, synthetic cathinones, designer benzodiazepines) and 15 classic drugs of abuse (DOA) in hair samples was developed and validated according to International Guidelines [112]. Samples pretreatment consisted of washing steps and overnight incubation at 45°C in an acid mixture of methanol and water. After cooling, supernatant were injected into the chromatographic system coupled with a tandem mass spectrometry detector. Results. Successful validation was achieved for almost all of the compounds. The method met all the required technical parameters. LOQ was set from 4 to 80 pg/mg The developed method was applied to 107 cases (85 males and 22 females) of clinical interest. Out of 85 hair samples resulting positive to classical drugs of abuse, NPS were found in twelve (8 male and 4 female). Conclusion. The present methodology represents an easy, low cost, wide-panel method for the de-tection of 127 NPS and 15 DOA in hair samples. Such multi-analyte methods facilitates the study of the prevalence of drugs abused that will enable the competent control authorities to obtain evi-dence-based reports regarding the critical spread of the threat represented by NPS.