A Web GIS Decision Support System For Coastal Risk Assessment and Mitigation Planning

Coastal flooding poses serious threats to coastal areas around the world, billions of dollars in damage to property and infrastructure, and threatens the lives of millions of people. Therefore, disaster management and risk assessment aims at detecting vulnerability and capacities in order to reduce coastal flood disaster risk. In particular, non-specialized researchers, emergency management personnel, and land use planners require an accurate, inexpensive method to determine and map risk associated with storm surge events and long-term sea level rise associated with climate change. This study contributes to the spatially evaluation and mapping of social-economic-environmental vulnerability and risk at sub-national scale through the development of appropriate tools and methods successfully embedded in a Web-GIS Decision Support System. A new set of raster-based models were studied and developed in order to be easily implemented in the Web-GIS framework with the purpose to quickly assess and map flood hazards characteristics, damage and vulnerability in a Multi-criteria approach. The Web-GIS DSS is developed recurring to open source software and programming language and its main peculiarity is to be available and usable by coastal managers and land use planners without requiring high scientific background in hydraulic engineering. The effectiveness of the system in the coastal risk assessment is evaluated trough its application to a real case study.

Development of quantitative methods for sustainability assessment in process industry

The increasing aversion to technological risks of the society requires the development of inherently safer and environmentally friendlier processes, besides assuring the economic competitiveness of the industrial activities. The different forms of impact (e.g. environmental, economic and societal) are frequently characterized by conflicting reduction strategies and must be holistically taken into account in order to identify the optimal solutions in process design. Though the literature reports an extensive discussion of strategies and specific principles, quantitative assessment tools are required to identify the marginal improvements in alternative design options, to allow the trade-off among contradictory aspects and to prevent the “risk shift”. In the present work a set of integrated quantitative tools for design assessment (i.e. design support system) was developed. The tools were specifically dedicated to the implementation of sustainability and inherent safety in process and plant design activities, with respect to chemical and industrial processes in which substances dangerous for humans and environment are used or stored. The tools were mainly devoted to the application in the stages of “conceptual” and “basic design”, when the project is still open to changes (due to the large number of degrees of freedom) which may comprise of strategies to improve sustainability and inherent safety. The set of developed tools includes different phases of the design activities, all through the lifecycle of a project (inventories, process flow diagrams, preliminary plant lay-out plans). The development of such tools gives a substantial contribution to fill the present gap in the availability of sound supports for implementing safety and sustainability in early phases of process design. The proposed decision support system was based on the development of a set of leading key performance indicators (KPIs), which ensure the assessment of economic, societal and environmental impacts of a process (i.e. sustainability profile). The KPIs were based on impact models (also complex), but are easy and swift in the practical application. Their full evaluation is possible also starting from the limited data available during early process design. Innovative reference criteria were developed to compare and aggregate the KPIs on the basis of the actual sitespecific impact burden and the sustainability policy. Particular attention was devoted to the development of reliable criteria and tools for the assessment of inherent safety in different stages of the project lifecycle. The assessment follows an innovative approach in the analysis of inherent safety, based on both the calculation of the expected consequences of potential accidents and the evaluation of the hazards related to equipment. The methodology overrides several problems present in the previous methods proposed for quantitative inherent safety assessment (use of arbitrary indexes, subjective judgement, build-in assumptions, etc.). A specific procedure was defined for the assessment of the hazards related to the formations of undesired substances in chemical systems undergoing “out of control” conditions. In the assessment of layout plans, “ad hoc” tools were developed to account for the hazard of domino escalations and the safety economics. The effectiveness and value of the tools were demonstrated by the application to a large number of case studies concerning different kinds of design activities (choice of materials, design of the process, of the plant, of the layout) and different types of processes/plants (chemical industry, storage facilities, waste disposal). An experimental survey (analysis of the thermal stability of isomers of nitrobenzaldehyde) provided the input data necessary to demonstrate the method for inherent safety assessment of materials.

Per un museo virtuale dell'informatica. Un supporto automatico per creare "visite museali"

The subject of the present research is related to the field of computer technology applied to support intellectual activities such as text translation, screenwriting and content organization of popular and education courses, especially concerning museum visits. The research has started with the deep analysis of the cognitive process which characterizes a screenwriter while working. This choice has been made because a screenplay is not only an aid to the realization of a show but, more in general, it can be considered as the planning of an education, popular and formative intellectual activity. After this analysis, the research has focused on the specific area of the planning, description and introduction of topics related to the history of science, and in particular, of computer science. To focus on this area it has been fundamental to analyse subjects concerning the didactics of museum visits organization. The aim was to find out the guide lines that a teacher should follow when planning the visit of a museum (virtual museum of the history of computer science). The consequent designing and realisation of an automatic support system for the description and the production of a formative, education and popular multimedia product (for the history of computer science), has been possible thanks to the results achieved through this research. The system obtained is provided by the following features: ·management of multimedia slides (such as texts, video, audio or images) which can be classified on the bases of the topic and of the profile of the user; ·automatic creation of a sequence of multimedia slides which introduce the topic; ·management of the interaction with the user to check and give validity to the product. The most innovative aspect of the present research is represented by the fact that the product is realised on the bases of the profile of the user.

Costruzione di un Sistema Informativo Geografico Digitale per analisi ambientali

Questo lavoro ha come obiettivo l’utilizzo del Geographical Information System (GIS) per effettuare analisi di sicurezza, monitoraggio e valutazioni di impatto ambientale. Oggi, la totalità delle operazioni GIS possono essere svolte con software open source e in questa sedi si è scelto di utilizzare il GIS GRASS (Geographic Resources Analysis Support System) disponibile nei termini della GNU public license (GPL), mostrando l’usabilità e le notevoli potenzialità di tale software, nonché la qualità dei prodotti ottenibili, mai inferiori ai prodotti e agli strumenti messi a disposizione dai più radicati e diffusi programmi proprietari. Nel capitolo 4, vedremo l’applicazione all’analisi delle conseguenze di ipotetici incidenti, durante le operazioni di dismissione dell’impianto di processamento del combustibile nucleare, di Bosco Marengo (AL). Nel capitolo 5, vedremo applicazioni nel campo del monitoraggio della qualità dell’aria tramite analisi di immagini satellitari.

Utilizzo delle bande dell’Infrarosso Termico in tecniche di remote sensing per applicazioni in ambito urbano

Il presente studio si concentra sulle diverse applicazioni del telerilevamento termico in ambito urbano. Vengono inizialmente descritti la radiazione infrarossa e le sue interazioni con l’atmosfera terrestre, le leggi principali che regolano lo scambio di calore per irraggiamento, le caratteristiche dei sensori e le diverse applicazioni di termografia. Successivamente sono trattati nel dettaglio gli aspetti caratteristici della termografia da piattaforma satellitare, finalizzata principalmente alla valutazione del fenomeno dell'Urban Heat Island; vengono descritti i sensori disponibili, le metodologie di correzione per gli effetti atmosferici, per la stima dell'emissività delle superfici e per il calcolo della temperatura superficiale dei pixels. Viene quindi illustrata la sperimentazione effettuata sull'area di Bologna mediante immagini multispettrali ASTER: i risultati mostrano come sull'area urbana sia riscontrabile la presenza dell'Isola di Calore Urbano, anche se la sua quantificazione risulta complessa. Si procede quindi alla descrizione di potenzialità e limiti della termografia aerea, dei suoi diversi utilizzi, delle modalità operative di rilievo e degli algoritmi utilizzati per il calcolo della temperatura superficiale delle coperture edilizie. Tramite l’analisi di alcune esperienze precedenti vengono trattati l’influenza dell’atmosfera, la modellazione dei suoi effetti sulla radianza rilevata, i diversi metodi per la stima dell’emissività. Viene quindi introdotto il progetto europeo Energycity, finalizzato alla creazione di un sistema GeoWeb di supporto spaziale alle decisioni per la riduzione di consumi energetici e produzione di gas serra su sette città dell'Europa Centrale. Vengono illustrate le modalità di rilievo e le attività di processing dei datasets digitali per la creazione di mappe di temperatura superficiale da implementare nel sistema SDSS. Viene infine descritta la sperimentazione effettuata sulle immagini termiche acquisite nel febbraio 2010 sulla città di Treviso, trasformate in un mosaico georiferito di temperatura radiometrica tramite correzioni geometriche e radiometriche; a seguito della correzione per l’emissività quest’ultimo verrà trasformato in un mosaico di temperatura superficiale.

Application of Submerged Grouted Anchors in Sheet Pile Quay Walls

Sheet pile walls are one of the oldest earth retention systems utilized in civil engineering projects. They are used for various purposes; such as excavation support system, cofferdams, cut-off walls under dams, slope stabilization, waterfront structures, and flood walls. Sheet pile walls are one of the most common types of quay walls used in port construction. The worldwide increases in utilization of large ships for transportation have created an urgent need of deepening the seabed within port areas and consequently the rehabilitation of its wharfs. Several methods can be used to increase the load-carrying capacity of sheet-piling walls. The use of additional anchored tie rods grouted into the backfill soil and arranged along the exposed wall height is one of the most practical and appropriate solutions adopted for stabilization and rehabilitation of the existing quay wall. The Ravenna Port Authority initiated a project to deepen the harbor bottom at selected wharves. An extensive parametric study through the finite element program, PLAXIS 2D, version 2012 was carried out to investigate the enhancement of using submerged grouted anchors technique on the load response of sheet-piling quay wall. The influence of grout-ties area, length of grouted body, anchor inclination and anchor location were considered and evaluated due to the effect of different system parameters. Also a comparative study was conducted by Plaxis 2D and 3D program to investigate the behavior of these sheet pile quay walls in terms of horizontal displacements induced along the sheet pile wall and ground surface settlements as well as the anchor force and calculated factor of safety. Finally, a comprehensive study was carried out by using different constitutive models to simulate the mechanical behavior of the soil to investigate the effect of these two models (Mohr-Coulomb and Hardening Soil) on the behavior of these sheet pile quay walls.

Le Zone Franche Urbane: Mercato europeo e Ordinamenti tributari

Lo studio delle Zone Franche Urbane all’interno del Diritto tributario europeo non ha potuto prescindere da una introduttiva delimitazione del lavoro, capace di distinguere le diverse tipologie di zone franche esistenti nei Paesi intra/extra Ue. Attraversando i casi-studio di Madeira, delle Azzorre, fino alla istituenda Zona Franca di Bruxelles, Zone d’Economie Urbaine stimulée (ZEUS), si è giunti alla constatazione dell’assenza di una definizione di Zona Franca Urbana: analizzando le esperienze normative vissute in Francia e in Italia, si è potuto tratteggiare il profilo territoriale, soggettivo e oggettivo del sistema agevolativo rivolto al recupero delle aree urbane degradate. La funzione strumentale della fiscalità, esplicitata per mezzo delle ZFU, ha condotto ad una verifica di diritto interno per controllare la legittimità delle scelte nazionali in ragione dei principi costituzionali nazionali, come anche una di diritto europeo per evitare che le scelte nazionali, anche se legittime sul piano interno, possano per gli stessi effetti incentivanti alle attività d'impresa presentarsi come una forma territoriale di aiuti di Stato fiscali. Evidenziando il rapporto tra le ZFU e il Mercato europeo si è voluto, da un lato, effettuare una ricostruzione sistemica necessaria per un’interpretazione delle ZFU che metta in luce le componenti di tale strumento orientate al perseguimento di un interesse socioeconomico, che in prima battuta generi una contraddizione, una deroga ai principi costituzionali e comunitari, per poi “sciogliersi” in una coerente applicazione degli stessi; dall’altro, tentare di elevare le ZFU a misura sistemica dell’Ordinamento europeo. Si è svolto, infine, un ragionamento in termini di federalismo fiscale con riferimento alle ZFU, trovando una adeguata collocazione nel percorso di devoluzione intrapreso dal legislatore nazionale, avendo quali interlocutori privilegiati le Regioni a Statuto Speciale.

Sviluppo di metodologie innovative di supporto decisionale alla progettazione basate su indicatori di prestazione

Il progetto di ricerca è finalizzato allo sviluppo di una metodologia innovativa di supporto decisionale nel processo di selezione tra alternative progettuali, basata su indicatori di prestazione. In particolare il lavoro si è focalizzato sulla definizione d’indicatori atti a supportare la decisione negli interventi di sbottigliamento di un impianto di processo. Sono stati sviluppati due indicatori, “bottleneck indicators”, che permettono di valutare la reale necessità dello sbottigliamento, individuando le cause che impediscono la produzione e lo sfruttamento delle apparecchiature. Questi sono stati validati attraverso l’applicazione all’analisi di un intervento su un impianto esistente e verificando che lo sfruttamento delle apparecchiature fosse correttamente individuato. Definita la necessità dell’intervento di sbottigliamento, è stato affrontato il problema della selezione tra alternative di processo possibili per realizzarlo. È stato applicato alla scelta un metodo basato su indicatori di sostenibilità che consente di confrontare le alternative considerando non solo il ritorno economico degli investimenti ma anche gli impatti su ambiente e sicurezza, e che è stato ulteriormente sviluppato in questa tesi. Sono stati definiti due indicatori, “area hazard indicators”, relativi alle emissioni fuggitive, per integrare questi aspetti nell’analisi della sostenibilità delle alternative. Per migliorare l’accuratezza nella quantificazione degli impatti è stato sviluppato un nuovo modello previsionale atto alla stima delle emissioni fuggitive di un impianto, basato unicamente sui dati disponibili in fase progettuale, che tiene conto delle tipologie di sorgenti emettitrici, dei loro meccanismi di perdita e della manutenzione. Validato mediante il confronto con dati sperimentali di un impianto produttivo, si è dimostrato che tale metodo è indispensabile per un corretto confronto delle alternative poiché i modelli esistenti sovrastimano eccessivamente le emissioni reali. Infine applicando gli indicatori ad un impianto esistente si è dimostrato che sono fondamentali per semplificare il processo decisionale, fornendo chiare e precise indicazioni impiegando un numero limitato di informazioni per ricavarle.

Variety, flexibility, and use of abstract concepts. A multiple grounded perspective.

The nature of concepts is a matter of intense debate in cognitive sciences. While traditional views claim that conceptual knowledge is represented in a unitary symbolic system, recent Embodied and Grounded Cognition theories (EGC) submit the idea that conceptual system is couched in our body and influenced by the environment (Barsalou, 2008). One of the major challenges for EGC is constituted by abstract concepts (ACs), like fantasy. Recently, some EGC proposals addressed this criticism, arguing that the ACs comprise multifaced exemplars that rely on different grounding sources beyond sensorimotor one, including interoception, emotions, language, and sociality (Borghi et al., 2018). However, little is known about how ACs representation varies as a function of life experiences and their use in communication. The theoretical arguments and empirical studies comprised in this dissertation aim to provide evidence on multiple grounding of ACs taking into account their varieties and flexibility. Study I analyzed multiple ratings on a large sample of ACs and identified four distinct subclusters. Study II validated this classification with an interference paradigm involving motor/manual, interoceptive, and linguistic systems during a difficulty rating task. Results confirm that different grounding sources are activated depending on ACs kind. Study III-IV investigate the variability of institutional concepts, showing that the higher the law expertise level, the stronger the concrete/emotional determinants in their representation. Study V introduced a novel interactive task in which abstract and concrete sentences serve as cues to simulate conversation. Analysis of language production revealed that the uncertainty and interactive exchanges increase with abstractness, leading to generating more questions/requests for clarifications with abstract than concrete sentences. Overall, results confirm that ACs are multidimensional, heterogeneous, and flexible constructs and that social and linguistic interactions are crucial to shaping their meanings. Investigating ACs in real-time dialogues may be a promising direction for future research.

Innovation in conceptual design of chemical processes

Nowadays, the chemical industry has reached significant goals to produce essential components for human being. The growing competitiveness of the market caused an important acceleration in R&D activities, introducing new opportunities and procedures for the definition of process improvement and optimization. In this dynamicity, sustainability is becoming one of the key aspects for the technological progress encompassing economic, environmental protection and safety aspects. With respect to the conceptual definition of sustainability, literature reports an extensive discussion of the strategies, as well as sets of specific principles and guidelines. However, literature procedures are not completely suitable and applicable to process design activities. Therefore, the development and introduction of sustainability-oriented methodologies is a necessary step to enhance process and plant design. The definition of key drivers as support system is a focal point for early process design decisions or implementation of process modifications. In this context, three different methodologies are developed to support design activities providing criteria and guidelines in a sustainable perspective. In this framework, a set of key Performance Indicators is selected and adopted to characterize the environmental, safety, economic and energetic aspects of a reference process. The methodologies are based on heat and material balances and the level of detailed for input data are compatible with available information of the specific application. Multiple case-studies are defined to prove the effectiveness of the methodologies. The principal application is the polyolefin productive lifecycle chain with particular focus on polymerization technologies. In this context, different design phases are investigated spanning from early process feasibility study to operative and improvements assessment. This flexibility allows to apply the methodologies at any level of design, providing supporting guidelines for design activities, compare alternative solutions, monitor operating process and identify potential for improvements.

Analytics and optimization for emergency healthcare processes

This thesis deals with the analysis and management of emergency healthcare processes through the use of advanced analytics and optimization approaches. Emergency processes are among the most complex within healthcare. This is due to their non-elective nature and their high variability. This thesis is divided into two topics. The first one concerns the core of emergency healthcare processes, the emergency department (ED). In the second chapter, we describe the ED that is the case study. This is a real case study with data derived from a large ED located in northern Italy. In the next two chapters, we introduce two tools for supporting ED activities. The first one is a new type of analytics model. Its aim is to overcome the traditional methods of analyzing the activities provided in the ED by means of an algorithm that analyses the ED pathway (organized as event log) as a whole. The second tool is a decision-support system, which integrates a deep neural network for the prediction of patient pathways, and an online simulator to evaluate the evolution of the ED over time. Its purpose is to provide a set of solutions to prevent and solve the problem of the ED overcrowding. The second part of the thesis focuses on the COVID-19 pandemic emergency. In the fifth chapter, we describe a tool that was used by the Bologna local health authority in the first part of the pandemic. Its purpose is to analyze the clinical pathway of a patient and from this automatically assign them a state. Physicians used the state for routing the patients to the correct clinical pathways. The last chapter is dedicated to the description of a MIP model, which was used for the organization of the COVID-19 vaccination campaign in the city of Bologna, Italy.

Real-time anomaly detection of gamma-ray bursts for the Cherenkov Telescope Array using deep learning

The Cherenkov Telescope Array (CTA) will be the next-generation ground-based observatory to study the universe in the very-high-energy domain. The observatory will rely on a Science Alert Generation (SAG) system to analyze the real-time data from the telescopes and generate science alerts. The SAG system will play a crucial role in the search and follow-up of transients from external alerts, enabling multi-wavelength and multi-messenger collaborations. It will maximize the potential for the detection of the rarest phenomena, such as gamma-ray bursts (GRBs), which are the science case for this study. This study presents an anomaly detection method based on deep learning for detecting gamma-ray burst events in real-time. The performance of the proposed method is evaluated and compared against the Li&Ma standard technique in two use cases of serendipitous discoveries and follow-up observations, using short exposure times. The method shows promising results in detecting GRBs and is flexible enough to allow real-time search for transient events on multiple time scales. The method does not assume background nor source models and doe not require a minimum number of photon counts to perform analysis, making it well-suited for real-time analysis. Future improvements involve further tests, relaxing some of the assumptions made in this study as well as post-trials correction of the detection significance. Moreover, the ability to detect other transient classes in different scenarios must be investigated for completeness. The system can be integrated within the SAG system of CTA and deployed on the onsite computing clusters. This would provide valuable insights into the method's performance in a real-world setting and be another valuable tool for discovering new transient events in real-time. Overall, this study makes a significant contribution to the field of astrophysics by demonstrating the effectiveness of deep learning-based anomaly detection techniques for real-time source detection in gamma-ray astronomy.

Adapting fruit production to climate change: how to increase intrinsic fruit quality and save water through deficit irrigation scheduling.

Fruit crops are an important resource for food security, since more than being nutrient they are also a source of natural antioxidant compounds, such as polyphenols and vitamins. However, fruit crops are also among the cultivations threatened by the harmful effects of climate change This study had the objective of investigating the physiological effects of deficit irrigation on apple (2020-2021), sour cherry (2020-2021-2022) and apricot (2021-2022) trees, with a special focus on fruit nutraceutical quality. On each trial, the main physiological parameters were monitored along the growing season: i) stem and leaf water potentials; ii) leaf gas exchanges; iii) fruit and shoot growth. At harvest, fruit quality was evaluated especially in terms of fruit size, flesh firmness and soluble solids content. Moreover, it was performed: i) total phenolic content determination; ii) anthocyanidin concentration evaluation; and iii) untargeted metabolomic study. Irrigation scheduling in apricot, apple and sour cherry is surely overestimated by the decision support system available in Emilia-Romagna region. The water stress imposed on different fruit crops, each during two years of study, showed as a general conclusion that the decrease in the irrigation water did not show a straightforward decrease in plant physiological performance. This can be due to the miscalculation of the real water needs of the considered fruit crops. For this reason, there is the need to improve this important tool for an appropriate water irrigation management. Furthermore, there is also the need to study the behaviour of fruit crops under more severe deficit irrigations. In fact, it is likely that the application of lower water amounts will enhance the synthesis of specialized metabolites, with positive repercussion on human health. These hypotheses must be verified.

Catalysts and processes for next-generation H2 production

The present study is focused on the development of new VIII group metal on CeO2 – ZrO2 (CZO) catalyst to be used in reforming reaction for syngas production. The catalyst are tested in the oxyreforming process, extensively studied by Barbera [44] in a new multistep process configuration, with intermediate H2 membrane separation, that can be carried out at lower temperature (750°C) with respect the reforming processes (900 – 1000°C). In spite of the milder temperatures, the oxy-reforming conditions (S/C = 0.7; O2/C = 0.21) remain critical regarding the deactivation problems mainly deriving from thermal sintering and carbon formation phenomena. The combination of the high thermal stability characterizing the ZrO2, with the CeO2 redox properties, allows the formation of stable mixed oxide system with high oxygen mobility. This feature can be exploited in order to contrast the carbon deposition on the active metal surface through the oxidation of the carbon by means of the mobile oxygen atoms available at the surface of the CZO support. Ce0.5Zr0.5O2 is the phase claimed to have the highest oxygen mobility but its formation is difficult through classical synthesis (co-precipitation), hence a water-in-oil microemulsion method is, widely studied and characterized. Two methods (IWI and bulk) for the insertion of the active metal (Rh, Ru, Ni) are followed and their effects, mainly related to the metal stability and dispersion on the support, are discussed, correlating the characterization with the catalytic activity. Different parameters (calcination and reduction temperatures) are tuned to obtain the best catalytic system both in terms of activity and stability. Interesting results are obtained with impregnated and bulk catalysts, the latter representing a new class of catalysts. The best catalysts are also tested in a low temperature (350 – 500°C) steam reforming process and preliminary tests with H2 membrane separation have been also carried out.

Oceanic Near-inertial internal waves generation, propagation and interaction with mesoscale dynamics

Oceans play a key role in the climate system, being the largest heat sinks on Earth. Part of the energy balance of ocean circulation is driven by the Near-inertial internal waves (NIWs). Strong NIWs are observed during a multi-platform, multi-disciplinary and multi-scale campaign led by the NATO-STO CMRE in autumn 2017 in the Ligurian Sea (northwestern Mediterranean Sea). The objectives of this work are as follows: characterise the studied area at different scales; study the NIWs generation and their propagation; estimate the NIWs properties; study the interaction between NIWs and mesoscale structures. This work provides, to the author’s knowledge, the first characterization of NIWs in the Mediterranean Sea. The near-surface NIWs observed at the fixed moorings are locally generated by wind bursts while the deeper waves originate in other regions and arrive at the moorings several days later. Most of the observed NIWs energy propagates downward with a mean vertical group velocity of (2.2±0.3) ⋅10-4 m s-1. On average, the NIWs have an amplitude of 0.13 m s-1 and mean horizontal and vertical wavelengths of 43±25 km and 125±35 m, while shorter wavelengths are observed at the near-coastal mooring, 36±2 km and 33±2 m, respectively. Most of the observed NIWs are blue shifted and reach a value 9% higher than the local inertial frequency. Only two observed NIWs are characterised by a redshift (up to 3% lower than the local inertial frequency). In support of the in situ observations, a high resolution numerical model is implemented using NEMO (Madec et al., 2019). Results show that anticyclones (cyclones) shift the frequency of NIWs to lower (higher) frequencies with respect to the local inertial frequency. Anticyclones facilitate the downward propagation of NIW energy, while cyclones dampen it. Absence of NIWs energy within an anticyclone is also investigated.