On the use of the exoskeleton for seismic improvement and integrated efficient technologies in existing buildings

The aim of this work is to investigate the seismic improvement obtained through external strengthening structures applied on existing reinforced concrete buildings. An innovative integration with pre-assembled technological envelope components is also presented with the aim of achieving a holistic renovation. Particular attention was paid to the timber solution with an innovative post-tensioned connection between cross-laminated timber panels, which was the subject of an experimental campaign

Internet of things: legal liability of IoE devices in the home

This thesis is about the smart home, a connected ambience that will help consumers to live a more environmentally sustainable life and will help vulnerable categories of consumers to live a more autonomous life, thanks to the pervasive use of the Internet of Things (IoT) technology. In particular, civil liability for the malfunctioning of the smart home is the filter through which the research is carried out. I analyse whether the actual legal liability rules are ready or not to adapt to this new connected environment, such as the IoT-powered smart home. Through careful mapping of the technical and legal state of the art, the thesis argues that the EU rules on product liability contained in the Product Liability Directive (PLD) will apply consistently to these objects. This holds true even if at the time of the drafting of the thesis, the proposal on the update of the PLD had not been published yet. Through the analysis of past PLD cases, new American products liability case-law on domestic IoT objects and the latest legal scholarship’s contributions and policy inputs it was possible to anticipate some of the contents of the newly published EU PLD Update proposal.

Application Platforms for the Internet of Things: Theory, Architecture, Protocols, Data Formats, and Privacy

The Internet of Things (IoT) is the next industrial revolution: we will interact naturally with real and virtual devices as a key part of our daily life. This technology shift is expected to be greater than the Web and Mobile combined. As extremely different technologies are needed to build connected devices, the Internet of Things field is a junction between electronics, telecommunications and software engineering. Internet of Things application development happens in silos, often using proprietary and closed communication protocols. There is the common belief that only if we can solve the interoperability problem we can have a real Internet of Things. After a deep analysis of the IoT protocols, we identified a set of primitives for IoT applications. We argue that each IoT protocol can be expressed in term of those primitives, thus solving the interoperability problem at the application protocol level. Moreover, the primitives are network and transport independent and make no assumption in that regard. This dissertation presents our implementation of an IoT platform: the Ponte project. Privacy issues follows the rise of the Internet of Things: it is clear that the IoT must ensure resilience to attacks, data authentication, access control and client privacy. We argue that it is not possible to solve the privacy issue without solving the interoperability problem: enforcing privacy rules implies the need to limit and filter the data delivery process. However, filtering data require knowledge of how the format and the semantics of the data: after an analysis of the possible data formats and representations for the IoT, we identify JSON-LD and the Semantic Web as the best solution for IoT applications. Then, this dissertation present our approach to increase the throughput of filtering semantic data by a factor of ten.

Use of essential oils and biocontrol cultures for the improvement of shelf-life of fresh cut products

The demand of minimally processed fruits and vegetables has increased in the last years. However, their intrinsic characteristics may favor the growth of pathogens and spoilage microbiota. The negative effects on human health reported for some traditional chemical sanitizers have justified the search for substitutes to guarantee food safety and quality. In this work we have evaluate the potential of some essential oils and their components to improve the safety and the shelf life of Lamb’s lettuce (Valerianella locusta) and apples (Golden delicious). Moreover, the effects of selected lactic acid bacteria alone or in combination with essential oils or their components, on the shelf-life and safety as well as organoleptic properties of minimally processed products, were evaluated. Since the lack of knowledge of microbial cell targets of essential oils represent one of the most important limit to the use of these molecules at industrial level, another aim of this thesis was the study of the action mechanisms of essential oils and their components. The results obtained showed the beneficial effects of the natural antimicrobials as well as the selected lactic acid bacteria on minimally processed fruit and vegetable safety and shelf-life, without detrimental effects on the quality parameters. The beneficial effects obtained by the use of the selected biocontrol agents were further increased combining them with selected natural antimicrobials. The natural antimicrobial employed induced noticeable modifications of membrane fatty acid profiles and volatile compounds produced by microbial cells during the growth. The modification of the expression in genes involved in fatty acid biosynthesis suggesting that the cytoplasmic membrane of microbial cells is one of the major cellular target of essential oils and their components. The comprehension of microbial stress response mechanisms can contribute to the scaling up of natural antimicrobials and bio-control agents at industrial level.