Assessing the effectiveness of ISO 3382 for evaluating the acoustical quality of italian historical theatres: the case study of the Bonci Theatre

The present study concerns the acoustical characterisation of Italian historical theatres. It moved from the ISO 3382 which provides the guidelines for the measurement of a well established set of room acoustic parameters inside performance spaces. Nevertheless, the peculiarity of Italian historical theatres needs a more specific approach. The Charter of Ferrara goes in this direction, aiming at qualifying the sound field in this kind of halls and the present work pursues the way forward. Trying to understand how the acoustical qualification should be done, the Bonci Theatre in Cesena has been taken as a case study. In September 2012 acoustical measurements were carried out in the theatre, recording monaural e binaural impulse responses at each seat in the hall. The values of the time criteria, energy criteria and psycho-acoustical and spatial criteria have been extracted according to ISO 3382. Statistics were performed and a 3D model of the theatre was realised and tuned. Statistical investigations were carried out on the whole set of measurement positions and on carefully chosen reduced subsets; it turned out that these subsets are representative only of the “average” acoustics of the hall. Normality tests were carried out to verify whether EDT, T30 and C80 could be described with some degree of reliability with a theoretical distribution. Different results, according to the varying assumptions underlying each test, were found. Finally, an attempt was made to correlate the numerical results emerged from the statistical analysis to the perceptual sphere. Looking for “acoustical equivalent areas”, relative difference limens were considered as threshold values. No rule of thumb emerged. Finally, the significance of the usual representation through mean values and standard deviation, which may be meaningful for normal distributed data, was investigated.

Urban water demand model: the case study of Emilia Romagna (Italy)

Water is the driving force in nature. We use water for washing cars, doing laundry, cooking, taking a shower, but also to generate energy and electricity. Therefore water is a necessary product in our daily lives (USGS. Howard Perlman, 2013). The model that we created is based on the urban water demand computer model from the Pacific Institute (California). With this model we will forecast the future urban water use of Emilia Romagna up to the year of 2030. We will analyze the urban water demand in Emilia Romagna that includes the 9 provinces: Bologna, Ferrara, Forli-Cesena, Modena, Parma, Piacenza, Ravenna, Reggio Emilia and Rimini. The term urban water refers to the water used in cities and suburbs and in homes in the rural areas. This will include the residential, commercial, institutional and the industrial use. In this research, we will cover the water saving technologies that can help to save water for daily use. We will project what influence these technologies have to the urban water demand, and what it can mean for future urban water demands. The ongoing climate change can reduce the snowpack, and extreme floods or droughts in Italy. The changing climate and development patterns are expected to have a significant impact on water demand in the future. We will do this by conducting different scenario analyses, by combining different population projections, climate influence and water saving technologies. In addition, we will also conduct a sensitivity analyses. The several analyses will show us how future urban water demand is likely respond to changes in water conservation technologies, population, climate, water price and consumption. I hope the research can contribute to the insight of the reader’s thoughts and opinion.

Whole ship energy optimization: the case study of a chemical tanker

La presente dissertazione investiga la possibilità di ottimizzare l’uso di energia a bordo di una nave per trasporto di prodotti chimici e petrolchimici. Il software sviluppato per questo studio può essere adattato a qualsiasi tipo di nave. Tale foglio di calcolo fornisce la metodologia per stimare vantaggi e miglioramenti energetici, con accuratezza direttamente proporzionale ai dati disponibili sulla configurazione del sistema energetico e sui dispositivi installati a bordo. Lo studio si basa su differenti fasi che permettono la semplificazione del lavoro; nell’introduzione sono indicati i dati necessari per svolgere un’accurata analisi ed è presentata la metodologia adottata. Inizialmente è fornita una spiegazione sul layout dell’impianto, sulle sue caratteristiche e sui principali dispositivi installati a bordo. Vengono dunque trattati separatamente i principali carichi, meccanico, elettrico e termico. In seguito si procede con una selezione delle principali fasi operative della nave: è seguito tale approccio in modo da comprendere meglio la ripartizione della richiesta di potenza a bordo della nave e il suo sfruttamento. Successivamente è svolto un controllo sul dimensionamento del sistema elettrico: ciò aiuta a comprendere se la potenza stimata dai progettisti sia assimilabile a quella effettivamente richiesta sulla nave. Si ottengono in seguito curve di carico meccanico, elettrico e termico in funzione del tempo per tutte le fasi operative considerate: tramite l’uso del software Visual Basic Application (VBA) vengono creati i profili di carico che possono essere gestiti nella successiva fase di ottimizzazione. L’ottimizzazione rappresenta il cuore di questo studio; i profili di potenza ottenuti dalla precedente fase sono gestiti in modo da conseguire un sistema che sia in grado di fornire potenza alla nave nel miglior modo possibile da un punto di vista energetico. Il sistema energetico della nave è modellato e ottimizzato mantenendo lo status quo dei dispositivi di bordo, per i quali sono considerate le configurazioni di “Load following”, “two shifts” e “minimal”. Una successiva investigazione riguarda l’installazione a bordo di un sistema di accumulo di energia termica, così da migliorare lo sfruttamento dell’energia disponibile. Infine, nella conclusione, sono messi a confronto i reali consumi della nave con i risultati ottenuti con e senza l’introduzione del sistema di accumulo termico. Attraverso la configurazione “minimal” è possibile risparmiare circa l’1,49% dell’energia totale consumata durante un anno di attività; tale risparmio è completamente gratuito poiché può essere raggiunto seguendo alcune semplici regole nella gestione dell’energia a bordo. L’introduzione di un sistema di accumulo termico incrementa il risparmio totale fino al 4,67% con un serbatoio in grado di accumulare 110000 kWh di energia termica; tuttavia, in questo caso, è necessario sostenere il costo di installazione del serbatoio. Vengono quindi dibattuti aspetti economici e ambientali in modo da spiegare e rendere chiari i vantaggi che si possono ottenere con l’applicazione di questo studio, in termini di denaro e riduzione di emissioni in atmosfera.

Relationships between plant diversity and environmental heterogeneity in rupicolous grasslands on gypsum. The case study of Alysso-Sedion albi (Habitat 6110).

Plant communities on weathered rock and outcrops are characterized by high values in species richness (Dengler 2006) and often persist on small and fragmented surfaces. Yet very few studies have examined the relationships between heterogeneity and plant diversity at small scales, in particular in poor-nutrient and low productive environment (Shmida and Wilson 1985, Lundholm 2003). In order to assess these relationships both in space and time in relationship, two different approaches were employed in the present study, in two gypsum outcrops of Northern Apennine. Diachronic and synchronic samplings from April 2012 to March 2013 were performed. A 50x50 cm plot was used in both samplings such as the sampling unit base. The diachronic survey aims to investigate seasonal patterning of plant diversity by the use of images analysis techniques integrated with field data and considering also seasonal climatic trend, the substrate quality and its variation in time. The purpose of the further, synchronic sampling was to describe plant diversity pattern as a function of the environmental heterogeneity meaning in substrate typologies, soil depth and topographic features. Results showed that responses of diversity pattern depend both on the resources availability, environmental heterogeneity and the manner in which the different taxonomic group access to them during the year. Species richness and Shannon diversity were positively affected by increasing in substrate heterogeneity. Furthermore a good turnover in seasonal species occurrence was detected. This vegetation may be described by the coexistence of three groups of species which created a gradient from early colonization stages, characterized by greater slope and predominance of bare rock, gradually to situation of more developed soil.

Isolated Islands? Memory of the Holocaust in Formal and Non-Formal Education. The Case Study of Post-Communist Poland

Existing studies revealed several conflicts around the memory of the Holocaust in Poland: between understanding the need to teach about the Holocaust and indifference toward anti-Jewish graffiti; a conflict around the perception of Polish help to Jews; and the competing images of Polish and Jewish suffering during World War II. Those conflicts will be addressed in the paper as reflecting educational gaps in the Polish education system (lack of bad memory). This paper will look at the consciousness of young Poles, in terms of attitudes toward Jews, the Holocaust and memory of the Holocaust. The data presented are the preliminary results of the author’s longitudinal study „Attitudes of Young Poles toward the Jews and the Holocaust”. Quantitative and qualitative studies include field studies and participant observation of educational projects in Tykocin, Treblinka, Warsaw, Lublin, Bodzentyn and Kielce. The paper will present some components of the development of education about the Holocaust in Poland. There is a need to evaluate the attempt to bring back the memory of Jewish neighbours in some of the states of Central and Eastern Europe, a process with an ongoing effort to renovate monuments, destroyed cemeteries and synagogues. The number and scope of such initiatives in Poland indicate that civic institutions and individuals are intensifying their efforts to teach their fellow citizens about the Holocaust, however their impact should be assessed in detail.

New Patterns of Democracy in the Countries of the Comparative Study of Electoral Systems

The chapter introduces a new database on political-institutional patterns of democracy used in the contributions to the book. It provides an update and extension of Lijphart’s (1999, 2012) measurement of consensus and majoritarian democracy for the countries of the second wave of the CSES during the period 1997–2006, using 11 partly improved indicators. The chapter explores patterns of democracy by the means of factor analysis, construct additive indices, and present the resulting country scores of consensus and majoritarian democracy graphically. Two variants are presented, one featuring Lijphart’s (1999) classic ‘executives–parties’ and ‘federal–unitary’ dimensions, and another incorporating direct democracy into the framework, yielding an additional ‘cabinets–direct democracy’ dimension

Cohort Profile: The Interdisciplinary Study of Inequalities in Smoking (ISIS)

The Interdisciplinary Study of Inequalities in Smoking (ISIS) is a cohort study investigating the joint effects of residents' socio-demographic characteristics and neighbourhood attributes on the social distribution of smoking in a young adult population. Smoking is a behaviour with an increasingly steep social class gradient; smoking prevalence among young adults is no longer declining at the same rate as among the rest of the population, and there is evidence of growing place-based disparities in smoking. ISIS was established to examine these pressing concerns. The ISIS sample comprises non-institutionalized individuals aged 18-25 years, who are proficient in English and/or French and who had been living at their current address in Montréal, Canada, for at least 1 year at time of first contact. Two waves of data have been collected: baseline data were collected November 2011-September 2012 (n = 2093), and a second wave of data was collected January-June 2014 (n = 1457). Data were collected from respondents using a self-administered questionnaire, developed by the research team based on sociological theory, which includes questions concerning social, economic, cultural and biological capital, and activity space as well as smoking behaviour. Data are available upon request from [katherine.frohlich@umontreal.ca].