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The main aim of this study was to define a procedure useful to evaluate the potential environmental, social and economic benefits contained in paper and cardboard (or other recyclables), which are wasted in the unsorted fraction of municipal solid waste (MSW). To give a practical example, the procedure was applied to the 550 municipalities of the Campania region, in Southern Italy, but the developed procedure is applicable in any context in an 'urban mining' perspective. The procedure consists of five phases and uses two methodologies: one for the estimation of the composition analysis of the unsorted residual waste and another for the calculation of sustainability indicators able to measure the benefits wasted in the unsorted residual MSW. Six indicators were defined: two for the environment (carbon footprint and ecological footprint), two for the society (health footprint and occupational benefits) and two for the economy (economic profit and economic saving). The first methodology was developed by the regional environmental protection agency to update the MSW regional management plan. The second methodology is based on the use of the Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) through which it was possible to calculate the reference parameters useful for the calculation of the impacts (i.e., loss of benefits) for recycling, mechanical and biological treatment (MBT), incineration and landfilling of paper and cardboard contained in the unsorted residual waste. The obtained results confirmed the presence of such an enormous deposit of recyclable materials contained in the unsorted residual waste, which is a potential source, but not exploited, of environmental, social and economic benefits. For instance, the paper and cardboard 'urban mine' of Naples was greater than 16 million of euro (economic profit + economic saving), with a potential saving of around 11.4 million of kgCO 2 eq. (carbon footprint), 207 million of m2 (ecological footprint), 44 Disability Adjusted Life Years (health footprint), with a creation of 30 job positions in the waste management sector (occupational benefits). [Display omitted] • A procedure consisting of five phases was developed using two methodologies. • One methodology estimates the composition analysis of the unsorted residual waste. • Another methodology used a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) approach. • Two indicators for the environment, two for the society and two for the economy. • The paper and cardboard 'urban mine' of Naples was greater than 16 million of euro. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Flow-like landslides are recognized to be the most destructive slope movements and to threaten human life. They may occur in several geological settings, as is the case of the pyroclastic soil covers resting on either igneous, or carbonate, bedrocks. The pyroclastic soil strata involved in these shallow landslides typically are partially saturated over the whole year. Intense rainfall, considered at hourly time scale, represents the triggering factor because it causes the decrease in matric suction and the consequent decrease in soil shear strength. However, it is recognized as the role of the hydromechanical slope behavior, the vegetation cover, and the geomorphological irregularities on shallow landslide hazard. These factors should be properly simulated in physically based predictive models of the failure onset to set up a reliable early warning system (EWS). This paper presents a new coupled thermohydraulic modeling of a pyroclastic soil cover in Campania, accounting for several slope factors that may predispose landslide activation, including the geomorphological local irregularities. The Mount Faito test site, in the Lattari Mountains (Southern Italy), has been adopted as a prototype slope for the geomorphological and hydromechanical scenarios of reference because of the extensive field and laboratory characterizations of the soil strata already available from previous studies. Once validated with these data, the numerical model has been used to estimate the slope response to critical rainfall scenarios. Such numerical estimations have been then compared to the instability predictions currently provided by empirical approaches, defined in terms of the intensity and duration of rainstorms threshold of shallow landslide activations. By comparison between the empirical and physically based approaches, the crucial role of antecedent slope hydraulic conditions and the geological setting for implementing reliable EWS, reducing false alarms, is proved. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Broad mountainous areas in the western Campania (southern Italy), where young pyroclastic deposits extensively outcrop, frequently experience rainfall-induced slope movements of different degrees of mobility, causing heavy damage and fatalities. Such landslides cannot be easily mitigated, and the implementation of physically based early warning systems is still not able to predict the post-failure evolution of slope movements and the exposed areas at risk. This paper is devoted to overcoming this limit. To this end, the mechanical characterization of pyroclastic soil, carried out through an extensive laboratory testing program, is presented and compared with those of two other ashy soils of different depositional mechanisms. The results show that the depositional mode influences soil properties; to begin with, it affects the unsaturated shear strength, whose intercept of cohesion is up to 5 kPa higher in ashes of flow deposition than in airfall ash deposits. The saturated undrained soil response allowed for the identification of different levels of susceptibility to the liquefaction of pyroclastic deposits, which is one of the main factors governing the post-failure evolution of landslides. Gathering all the acquired information, including saturated and unsaturated soil shear strength, permeability function, and water retention curves, into a soil database, it was possible to present all data under a unitary framework. Finally, the implementation of the proposed flowchart for a simplified assessment of post-failure evolution to be employed in regional early warning systems can enhance our knowledge of the areas at risk. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, integrating field surveys and literature data, an analysis of Ophioglossum lusitanicum plant communities and related 92/43/EEC habitats are reported for Italy. Two new syntaxa, Euphorbio exiguae-Ophioglossetum lusitanici ass. nova hoc loco and trifolietosum scabri subass. nova hoc loco of the Rumici bucephalophori-Ophioglossetum lusitanici were described in the Apulia and Campania regions.Both types of vegetation identified in Apulia, Campania, and Sicily regions represent two different aspects of the same priority habitat: "pseudo-steppe with grasses and annuals of the Thero-Brachypodietea" (habitat code 6220*). A phytosociological and ecological dataset of the literature and new field surveys highlighting the soil type as parameters affecting the vegetation cover of this small fernlike plant, with the Trachynion distachyae Rivas–Martínez, 1978 alliance on calcareous soils and Helianthemion guttati Br.-Bl. in Br.-Bl. et al., 1940 alliance on volcanic soils. Many species of other types of annual meadows have been identified within Ophioglossum communities due to the very small patches of land, where they have been found, and ecological conditions that facilitate this phenomenon of the transgression of other therophytes species. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper reports field data provided by the automatic monitoring of the annual hydrological response of a shallow deposit of loose pyroclastic soils located in a mountainous area of Campania, Southern Italy. The monitoring station is installed along the northern slope of mount Cornito, about 2 km east of the town of Cervinara, which in December 1999 had been involved in a rainfall-induced flowslide. The collected data concern rainfall height, soil moisture content and suction. In particular, the installation at the same depths of suction and moisture sensors allows to estimate the soil water retention features that seem to indicate some hysteretic nature of the wetting/drying processes induced by weather conditions and their influence on the local stability conditions. The data reported in the paper are freely available at https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.4281166 (Comegna et al., 2020). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Humans are mostly exposed to ionizing radiation through radon and its decay products. The results of indoor radon measurements in 39 kindergartens and primary schools in the Campania region of southern Italy are presented in this paper. The survey was carried out with CR-39 solid-state nuclear track detectors (SSNTDs). Radon concentrations were measured and ranged from 11 to 1416 Bq/m3, with a geometric mean of 77 Bq/m3 and a geometric standard deviation of 2. The findings revealed that 70% of the measures were below the WHO recommended level of 100 Bq/m3 and that 97 percent of the measurements were below the 300 Bq/m3 level set by Italian law. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• There are few examples of field survey data being utilized to test the effectiveness of UN SDG indicator 15.3.1. • The annual mean of NDVI shows some weakness in detecting land productivity dynamics. • Remote sensing coupled with a cloud-based computing platform may improve knowledge of the land productivity index. • The trend of maximum NDVI values appears more suitable for the assessing of land degradation processes. • Analysis of finer resolution satellite datasets is the best solution for regional/local contexts. Land degradation is a critical issue at a global level and its progressive increasing greatly reduces soil ecosystem services. In this context, the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, adopted by all United Nations Member States in 2015, defined the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and indicated some targets of particular interest for a territory to be integrated into short- and medium-term national programs. Target 15.3, which aims to end desertification and restore degraded lands, is currently monitored by indicator 15.3.1, measured as the combination of three sub-indicators (trends in land cover change, land productivity and carbon stocks) as suggested by the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), the custodian agency for the SDG indicator. In our opinion, this assessment shows some weakness that are generally caused by a lack of information from direct field observations. The greatest limitation regards land productivity dynamics linked to the NDVI trajectory adopted by the UNCCD methodological approach. For this reason, the paper proposes an alternative approach that consists of using annual maximum NDVI value assessments instead of annual mean values for trajectory calculation. To come to these conclusions, the study addresses a reliability assessment by using remote sensing techniques via the Google Earth Engine (GEE) and analysing the NDVI evolution over time at 450 locations spread around the Campania region (southern Italy). To this end, a customised Graphical User Interface (GUI) was built on the GEE platform and a Google Earth time slider tool was applied to visualize land cover changes which occurred at each location over a period of 18 years (2001–2018). The survey was carried out on MODIS and Landsat 7 collections and showed that the new approach had a better performance than the UNCCD approach (90 % vs 62 % of successful reliability tests, up to 96 % considering results from Landsat images). The application of maximum NDVI values to assess productivity dynamics spatially shows, with regard to UNCCD data, more than double the percentages of degraded and stable lands and a drastic reduction in improved areas within the Campania region. Overall, this innovative approach appears to agree more closely with ground truth and the use of finer resolution data is more suitable for investigating land degradation processes within a regional context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent events, including the floods in central Europe in May 2021, have highlighted how climate change is giving rise to scenarios that were neither foreseen nor predictable. One problem this poses is the need to rethink the logic of various environmental constraints that are often based on return times of 20-50 years or 100-200. A single event does not change the statistical expectations for the recurrence of the event itself, but the recurrence of several extraordinary events in a few years is a clear indication of a changing trend. The prevention of the effects of such events is based on the definition of the areas at greater or lesser risk specifically based on the return times of the exceptional events, so it is foreseeable that a series of territorial plans, mostly carried out a few decades ago, will have to be updated or re-executed from scratch. These reworkings will be able to take advantage of the opensource software and open spatial data that have become available in the meantime, facilitating the entire process, and making it more open and shareable. In this paper we tested on a real case (the May 1999 pyroclastic flows in Campania, southern Italy) the actual possibility of implementing a model for forecasting such events using only open-source software and open data. It has been demonstrated that the entire process can be carried out using only open-source resources and it has been verified that the predictions of the hazard and risk model obtained with only input data prior to the event, give an output prediction that is significantly coincident with the events that actually occurred as documented by the authorities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nowadays, Artificial intelligence (AI), combined with the digitalization of healthcare, can lead to substantial improvements in Patient Care, Disease Management, Hospital Administration, and supply chain effectiveness. Among predictive analytics tools, time series forecasting represents a central task to support healthcare management in terms of bookings and medical services predictions. In this context, the development of flexible frameworks to provide robust and reliable predictions became a central point in this healthcare innovation process. This paper presents and discusses a multi-source time series fusion and forecasting framework relying on Deep Learning. By combining weather, air-quality and medical bookings time series through a feature compression stage which preserves temporal patterns, the prediction is provided through a flexible ensemble technique based on machine learning models and a hybrid neural network. The proposed system is able to predict the number of bookings related to a specific medical examination for a 7-days horizon period. To assess the proposed approach's effectiveness, we rely on time series extracted from a real dataset of administrative e-health records provided by the Campania Region health department, in Italy. • We propose a multi-source time-series fusion methodology relying on Deep Learning. • We design a robust framework for daily 7-days-horizon predictions. • We assess the proposed approach on a real medical bookings dataset. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the effects of indigenous vegetation on the shear strength of loose pyroclastic soils of the Campania region (southern Italy); these soils are frequently affected by shallow landslides 1–2 m deep that experience static liquefaction during the post-failure stage. Perennial graminae grasses were seeded in a one-dimensional column 2 m high and filled by pyroclastic soils, allowing the root to grow under atmospheric conditions. A noninvasive sampling procedure was adopted to take the vegetated soil samples, in which the roots were in their natural geometrical distribution. For each rooted sample, the root biomass, RM, was measured and the root volume density, RVD, was calculated. Isotropic consolidated triaxial tests in both drained and undrained conditions were performed on the rooted specimens, as well as on bare specimens as a control. The obtained results showed that the roots generally provided an increment to the soil strength. In drained conditions a reduction in the volumetric deformation was observed, which, under undrained conditions, was reflected in a general reduction of the excess pore-water pressures with a possible inhibition of the static liquefaction occurrence. This study highlights the potential role of grass roots as bio-engineering practice for stabilizing shallow covers of pyroclastic soils. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The 11th revision of the International Classification of Diseases and Related Disorders (ICD-11) has been released. In order to test the clinical consistency and the clinical utility of the proposed guidelines the World Health Organization (WHO) has carried out the Ecological Implementation Field Studies in various countries. In this paper the results of the Italian field trials on the clinical utility of the ICD-11 diagnostic guideline concerning schizophrenia and related disorders will be presented. Methods: In Italy, field trials have been carried out at the Department of Psychiatry of the University of Campania "L. Vanvitelli". All patients showing any psychotic symptom and referring to the outpatient and inpatient units have been recruited. Patients were interviewed by two clinicians with whom they had not had any prior clinical contact. At the end of each interview, clinicians were asked to complete 12 questions about the clinical utility of the diagnostic guidelines as applied to each patient. Results: Fourteen clinicians and 100 patients have been involved. The ICD-11 clinical guidelines were perceived as easy to use, with an adequate goodness of fit, clear and understandable and with an adequate level of details and specificity to describe the essential features of the diagnoses. Clinicians rated very positively their usefulness in describing the threshold between patient's disorder and normality. Despite still very positive, the guidelines have been perceived as less useful to select a treatment, to assess patients' prognosis and to communicate with other mental health professionals. Conclusions: The 11th revision of the chapter on Mental, Behavioural and Neurodevelopmental Disorders has made substantive changes to the conceptualization of mental disorders which could have impacted on their reliability and clinical utility. Results of the Italian field studies, in line with those reported by the international sample, highlight that ICD-11 has been rated as highly clinically useful by participating clinician, more than the ICD-10. This could be considered a good reason to be optimistic about the implementation of the ICD-11 among global clinicians. Trial registration The study has been approved by the Ethical Review Board of the University of Campania "L. Vanvitelli" (N. 416, 2016) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper focuses on the seismic response of earth dams close to active faults. The engineering implications of such an issue may be crucial since many existing dams, which have been in operation for several years, are located nearby or even on seismogenic faults. Owing to their size, large earth dams could dramatically be compromised by near-source ground motion. The spatial variability of the incoming seismic wave could promote differential settlements in the dam body and consequently fractures in the watertightness elements with an overall decrease of dam safety. The paper refers to the iconic case of Conza Dam in Italy. During its construction, it was seriously damaged by the catastrophic 1980 Irpinia earthquake (M = 6.9), whose epicenter was very close to the dam site. To model the seismic wave propagation from the causative fault to the dam site, a physics-based approach has been adopted by implementing the domain reduction method to simulate the whole boundary value problem. Two models were hence considered: a regional model, containing the source and the propagation medium of the Campania region basin, and a site model containing the upper foundation soils and the dam body. The paper compares the different response of the dam in the hypothesis of contemplating or disregarding near-source effects. Finally, the dam performance to seismic scenarios resembling the source mechanism of the 1980 Irpinia earthquake was analysed to ascertain the resilience of the dam to future earthquake scenarios having source characteristics similar to those of the 1980 event. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The waste crisis in Campania has inspired a vast amount of studies. Nevertheless, very little research has been done to explain the figures of waste generation and disposal in the region. The analyses carried out so far according to the indicators used by official statistics – i.e. Waste Generated, Waste Generated per capita and Separate Collection – fail to represent this hot spot case. This paper attempts to bridge this gap. Adopting the rationale of a new accounting system, the Multi-Scale Integrated Analysis of Societal and Ecosystem Metabolism (MuSIASEM), two waste indicators are proposed to complement the conventional ones: the Metabolic Rate of Waste and the Density of Waste. Then a multi-scale analysis of the Density of Waste Disposed (DWD) tests its suitability to characterise Campania’s waste patterns. The data cover the period from 1999 to 2007. The results show that the DWD complements available indicators and further helps to explain the biophysical pressure and ecological unsustainability of the waste management in the region. The multi-scale analysis shows that regional data hide a relevant territorial diversity, emergent in the provincial analysis and even more so in the municipal one. These results have implications for governance and for the debate about mono-scale versus multi-scale solutions to waste management problems. Finally, the analysis allows some analytical generalisations on the suitability of the DWD to detect situations of potential waste crisis in other study-contexts. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The paper reports a study on the capillary barrier effects in a layered pyroclastic deposit with different permeabilities. During prolonged low intensity rainfall, such phenomena lead to a significant increase in saturation in the least permeable soil layers. This is a common situation on the slopes of Pizzo D'Alvano (Campania, Southern Italy) where severe landslides were triggered in May 1998, and in many other geological environments where geological, sedimentological, geomorphologic and pedological processes may have produced a sequence of soils with different hydraulic conductivity. The results of laboratory column infiltration tests and evidence of capillary barrier effects are presented and used in the calibration of numerical unsaturated flow models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The present work is focused on investigating the potential role of capillary barriers on the stability of layered soil deposits laying upon high permeability steep slopes. In presence of capillary barrier effects, often possible on a soil stratigraphy characterized by contrasting hydraulic properties (pyroclastics deposit over pumices, silt upon fractured bedrock, silt over sand) failure might originate in less permeable layers, where unsaturated conditions might provide a crucial contribution to stability. Basic ideas and considerations have been drawn from a peculiar case study, the catastrophic landslide occurred in Campania, Southern Italy, on May 1998, which is discussed in this paper from a different perspective. The areal extent of failures’ distribution, their dense concentration at the steeper and higher slopes, the extremely high number of initial failures occurred within a relatively short time span suggest that the intimate cause of the event is related at some extent to the soil state characteristic parameters rather than positive pore pressure pulses from water circulation in coarser layers or groundwater level rising from bedrock and springs. A widespread loss of soil strength related to saturation can contribute to explain such phenomena. Capillary barrier effects favor accumulation and lateral distribution of percolating rainfall and possibly divert flowlines downslope, thus leading to localized increases in water content and loss of strength. Diversion of percolating waters facilitates lateral redistribution of soil moisture along the slope with possible further localized saturation, because more permeable layers may act temporarily as barriers and not as drains, as one could expect. Numerical 2-D infiltration models with parameters calibrated versus laboratory data show a relevant influence of capillary barrier effects on infiltration in layered slopes with vertically stratified variations of hydraulic properties and point out significant localized moisture accumulation with possible consequences on slope stability. Landslide initiation phenomena in layered covers might thus be conditioned by the increase in saturation within the least permeable soil layers due to capillary barrier phenomena. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: A complexity indicator based on the diversity of energy and resource uses by a system is proposed in this paper. The indicator is an emergy-based index of complexity derived from a modified Shannon information formula that provides a quantitative assessment of the diversity of sources. The emergy approach assigns to each driving input a weight that derives from the environmental work performed by nature in order to generate such resource. This quality assessment goes far beyond the simple accounting of mass and energy of input flows, but takes into proper account their interlinkage with the biosphere dynamics. The rationale of the proposed indicator is that complexity cannot be assessed by simply counting individuals, species and processes, but requires that focus is placed on several aspects of resource flows, namely their amount, frequency, and quality. Different mixes of emergy input flows originate different levels of growth and complexity. Systems that only rely on a small set of sources out of the large number potentially available possess a built-in fragility, that may determine their collapse in times of shrinking or changing resource basis. For validation purpose, the proposed indicator was applied to the performance of selected national economies (Nicaragua, Latvia, Denmark and Italy) in selected years and of the urban system of Roma (Italy) over a forty-year (1962–2002) historical series. Results point out an increasing complexity of the urban system of Rome over time, while a lower complexity was calculated for the investigated national systems as a whole (likely effect of nationwide averaging), with Italy ranking highest and Latvia lowest. The same assessment performed for the Italian agricultural system over a twenty-year time series (1985–2006) shows a decline of the emergy-adjusted Shannon indicator from about 75% down to 62%, while the decline was from 73% to 63% for the agriculture of Campania region (southern Italy). [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The paper presents new and important 14C data from eight Eneolithic sites in Campania measured at the Centre for Isotopic Research of Cultural and Environmental Heritage (CIRCE) AMS laboratory in Caserta (Italy). Twenty-four 14C determinations on bone and charcoal are used here for chronological reconstruction of human habitation and dating of some volcanic eruptions affecting the settlement activity. Our research has shed new light on absolute chronology of the whole Campanian Eneolithic, a period of profound cultural transformations triggered by introduction and use of metals, in particular copper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Campania Region (Italy), one of the most densely populated areas in Europe, is probably the one with the highest risk of landslide. A large part of the region is covered by unsaturated cohesionless pyroclastic deposits subjected to rainfall-induced landslides. According to experience, these can display different features and magnitude. The most catastrophic landslides are liquefied debris flows which periodically occur on steep slopes, causing death and destruction in areas located downslope. Therefore, zoning of those areas which can be the source of liquefied debris flow is necessary. The paper reports some useful elements for zoning based on infinite slope analysis, accounting for the results of recent research on the mechanics of rainfall-induced landslides in pyroclastic soils. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: In the Northern Campanian coastal zone, over 150 km long, three geomorphic units are recognised: (1) sandy beaches that are well developed in the northern area, where a prominent river mouth (Volturno River) is also present; (2) steep and rocky shores, often with gravelly beaches or debris cones at their base, are mainly diffuse in the southern area (Sorrentine Peninsula); and, lastly, (3) “techno coast”, shorelines stabilized with revetments and seawalls as well as former natural environments no longer clearly operational because of urbanization, as is visible in Naples and in the Vesuvian coast. Six primary hazards are considered in this investigation: shoreline erosion, riverine flooding, storms, landslides, seismicity and volcanism, and man-made structures. These hazards do not have a uniform distribution along this coast in terms of their frequency and intensity; moreover both their interaction and the intensive action of humans, often uncontrolled, makes it difficult to assess the overall coastal hazard. In this paper a semi-quantitative method with which to quantify, rank and map the distribution of hazard is applied along this particular stretch of coast. In such a stretch, previously characterized in terms of types and processes and compartmentalized into geomorphic units, the effect of individual hazards, based on their magnitude and recurrence, is evaluated. Dominant and subordinate hazards for each geomorphic unit are identified, assigning a rank that is also a weighting. Comparison of each weighting through an interaction matrix permits the calculation of a resultant, which is the overall hazard assessment and which can be expressed cartographically. The results obtained for a coastal zone with one of the highest pressures from urbanization in the world, help us to recognise that this approach could become a useful tool to aid decision-making regarding coastal land-use and planning. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Cyanobacteria are ubiquitous photosynthetic microorganisms considered as important contributors to the formation of Earth's atmosphere and to the process of nitrogen fixation. However, they are also frequently associated with toxic blooms, named cyanobacterial harmful algal blooms (cyanoHABs). This paper reports on an unusual out-of-season cyanoHAB and its dynamics during the COVID-19 pandemic, in Lake Avernus, South Italy. Fast detection strategy (FDS) was used to assess this phenomenon, through the integration of satellite imagery and biomolecular investigation of the environmental samples. Data obtained unveiled a widespread Microcystis sp. bloom in February 2020 (i.e., winter season in Italy), which completely disappeared at the end of the following COVID-19 lockdown, when almost all urban activities were suspended. Due to potential harmfulness of cyanoHABs, crude extracts from the "winter bloom" were evaluated for their cytotoxicity in two different human cell lines, namely normal dermal fibroblasts (NHDF) and breast adenocarcinoma cells (MCF-7). The chloroform extract was shown to exert the highest cytotoxic activity, which has been correlated to the presence of cyanotoxins, i.e., microcystins, micropeptins, anabaenopeptins, and aeruginopeptins, detected by molecular networking analysis of liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Simple Summary: As buffalo milk is important in Italy, especially in the southern regions where Protected Designation of Origin (PDO) buffalo mozzarella from Campania is produced, the need has arisen to trace the path of milk from the farm to the dairy. We aimed to verify the applicability of a buffalo tracing system throughout the national territory, following the Ministerial Decree of 9 September 2014. Use of the online system is mandatory for breeders, dairies, and intermediaries, and is required to record and communicate all milk that is produced, bought, and sold. In Italy, the number of registrations is more representative in the Campania region, which has the highest concentration of dairy buffalo herds; for the other regions, the number of farms registered in the system is less representative. The system highlights that the circuit of non-PDO products absorbs 35% of the total milk produced, while 65% of the milk is processed in PDO dairies, which allows for the control of milk production throughout the territory and facilitates the control of milk that proceeds to be frozen or that can only be used in non-PDO productions; this increases the transparency of the supply chain. The system is a computerized archive of the productions for all the operators in the sector. This document describes the development of a tracing system for the buffalo supply chain, namely an online computer system in which farmers, dairies, and brokers must maintain records of the production of milk through to the production of derivatives. The system is jointly used throughout the Italian national territory by the Istituto Zooprofilattico Sperimentale del Mezzogiorno (IZSM) and the Sistema Informativo Agricolo Nazionale Italiano (SIAN), after being made mandatory and regulated with the publication of the Ministerial Decree of 9 September 2014. Farmers are obligated to communicate their daily production of bulk milk, the number of animals milked, the number of the delivery note of the sale, and the name of the purchaser; within the first week of the month, they must communicate the milk production of each animal milked. Dairies are required to communicate the milk and the processed product (mozzarella, yogurt, etc.) purchased on a daily basis. The intermediaries are required to communicate the daily milk purchased, both fresh and frozen, the semi-finished product, and the sale of the same. The tracing system linked to the project authorized by the Ministry of Health, called "Development, validation and verification of the applicability of an IT system to be used for the management of traceability in the buffalo industry", provides operators with the monitoring of production and sales in real time through alerts and access logs. Currently, there are 1531 registered farmers, 601 non-PDO dairies, 102 PDO dairies, 68 non-PDO intermediaries, and 17 PDO intermediaries in Italy. The system provides support for the recovery of the buffalo sector; from the analysis of the data extrapolated from the tracing system of the buffalo supply chain for the years 2016 to 2019, this paper highlights that the application of the Ministerial Decree No. 9406 of 9 September 2014 and the tracing of the supply chain have increased the price of buffalo milk at barns from EUR 1.37/kg to EUR 1.55/kg from 2016 to 2019. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

According to the Italian national Energy strategy elaborated in 2017, the biomass sector has one of the most important strategic roles in energy renewables policy. Thus, estimating the potential of this resource is crucial for its energy valorization. Therefore, in this paper, a method to assess the energy potential from residual biomass is presented. The availability of residual biomass and its energy potential are estimated by using statistical and literature data. To account for the variability of the factors taken into account a comprehensive literature review is carried out focusing on the case studies related to Mediterranean areas. Based on the collected data, uncertainty analysis and sensitivity analysis are performed to provide reliable results. As a case study, the energy potential of residual biomass from agro-industry in the Campania region (southern Italy) is considered. The proposed method allows estimating a total of about 14.5 PJ per year of recoverable primary energy potential in the Campania region, which may cover around 14% of its thermal demand. The analysis carried out is intended to be a useful tool for policymakers of Mediterranean regions, to integrate energy recovery from agro-industrial biomass in the regulatory and investment strategies of the energy sector. • A model to estimate energy potential of residual biomasses typical of Mediterranean climate conditions is presented. • As a case study, a southern Italy region is taken into account. • The recoverable bio-energy potential may cover around 16% of the regional thermal demand. • The analysis may be a useful tool for policymakers of Mediterranean regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Radon is a naturally occurring radioactive gas present in the hydrosphere, lithosphere and atmosphere abundantly. Its ionizing radiation provides the largest human internal exposure by inhalation and ingestion to natural sources, constituting a serious health hazard. The contribution to total exposure is mainly due to inhalation, as ingestion by food or drinking water is typically very small. However, because of public health concerns, the contributions from all these sources are limited by regulations and remedial action should be taken in the event that the defined threshold values are overcome. In this paper, the first campaign of measurements to control the radon activity concentration in drinking water from public water supplies in the province of Salerno, south Italy, is described. The results represent a main reference for the area, as it was never investigated before. The purpose of this survey was to contribute to data compilation concerning the presence of radon-222 in groundwater in the Campania region and to determine the associated risk for different age groups. The maximum radon activity concentrations and the related total annual public effective dose turned out to be lower than the threshold values (100 Bq/l and 0.1 mSv/y, respectively) indicated by international guidelines and the national regulation, showing that the health risks for public consumption can be considered negligible. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Lack of accurate and up-to-date data associated with irrigated areas and related irrigation amounts is hampering the full implementation and compliance of the Water Framework Directive (WFD). In this paper, we describe the framework that we developed and implemented within the DIANA project to map the actual extent of irrigated areas in the Campania region (Southern Italy) during the 2018 irrigation season. For this purpose, we considered 202 images from the Harmonized Landsat Sentinel-2 (HLS) products (57 images from Landsat 8 and 145 images from Sentinel-2). Such data were preprocessed in order to extract a multitemporal Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) map, which was then smoothed through a gap-filling algorithm. We further integrated data coming from high-resolution (4 km) global satellite precipitation Precipitation Estimation from Remotely Sensed Information using Artificial Neural Networks (PERSIANN)-Cloud Classification System (CCS) products. We collected an extensive ground truth in the field represented by 2992 data points coming from three main thematic classes: bare soil and rainfed (class 0), herbaceous (class 1), and tree crop (class 2). This information was exploited to generate irrigated area maps by adopting a machine learning classification approach. We compared six different types of classifiers through a cross-validation approach and found that, in general, random forests, support vector machines, and boosted decision trees exhibited the best performances in terms of classification accuracy and robustness to different tested scenarios. We found an overall accuracy close to 90% in discriminating among the three thematic classes, which highlighted promising capabilities in the detection of irrigated areas from HLS products. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pyroclastic soils are widespread in the world. In particular, they cover a great part of Campania, a densely populated country of Southern Italy, where some distinct volcanic centers are present. In these soils, precipitations can trigger fast flow-like landslides causing destruction and loss of human lives. The movement style, the high velocity and the long run-out of these landslides are an indication of the occurrence, in the saturated soil mass, of mechanisms of undrained instability due to the inability of soil to sustain the deviator stress related to the slope condition. This paper reports the results of a wide experimental laboratory program carried out on a volcanic ash, which recently has been the seat of a killer landslide, stressing the factors that govern the undrained response of these materials. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Shallow flowslides, debris flows and debris avalanches are rainfall-induced landslides consisting in the shear failure of few metres of soils (or in some cases even less than a metre), which greatly increase downslope in volume and flow velocity. The southern Italian region of Campania has been historically affected by such events involving pyroclastic soils mainly resting on steep carbonate slopes. This paper deals with the analysis of factors influencing the occurrence of flow-like landslides, adopting the Lattari Mts. in Campania as a case study. The results of two investigation campaigns carried out in the area allowed effective large-scale geological and geotechnical characterization to be set up. Stratigraphic profiles, mean physical properties and typical friction angles at the critical state for each soil layer were investigated. The effect of suction on peak and critical shear strength, whose drop is responsible for soil failure, was analysed. Using detailed information on both the stratigraphic and geotechnical features of the soils involved in past flow-like landslides, typical triggering models were selected, representing locally recurrent geomorphologic conditions at the basin scale. The identified models were adopted for slope stability analyses carried out on four cross-sections of flowslides occurring prior to the event, to back-analyse the triggering conditions. From the evidence on the triggering mechanisms and the results of analyses, the infinite slope approach is not always suitable to model slope stability conditions properly, because the onset of landslides is also affected by local topographic and stratigraphic factors. • Flow-like landslides can be triggered due to local features. • Local topographic irregularities can be represented by roads, tracks, scarps and terraces. • Infinite slope model can be suitable to model only slopes characterized by angles higher than 39–40°. • Local natural and anthropic factors can affect the results of slope stability analysis. • The triggered landslides occurred when the 3-months precedent rainfall exceeded the 40 years average value. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]