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ABSTRACT In this study, the suitability of a nano-silica based consolidant for the conservation of a volcanic tuff was evaluated. The consolidant consists of an aqueous suspension of nano-silica particles [...]

ABSTRACTThis paper reports a detailed study on some relevant portions of the main façades of Caserta Royal Palace (Reggia di Caserta), one of the most important Italian monuments, comparable for its impressive architecture to the Royal Palace of Versailles in France and considered the largest royal palace in the world by volume. The research was focused on the weathering pathologies affecting the stone surfaces that, in the last decades, suffered several detachments of fragments from the coatings and from other architectural elements such as string courses, eaves, and capitals. A preliminary characterization of the materials of the façades and an evaluation of the relative weathering pathologies provided the information required for appropriate restoration and securing of these portions of the building. In particular, an innovative evaluation procedure which draws on techniques typical of the earth sciences allowed the proposal of a ‘risk attitude’ applied to discrete portions of the geomaterials used in the built heritage which is based on the influence of different factors leading to weakening of the stone and to the final detachment of rock fragments. Such a large and complete set of information should be carefully considered by the project planners to adopt the required steps for a suitable risk mitigation and for securing the site during restoration.

With the wide adoption of cloud computing across technology industries and research institutions, an ever-growing interest in cloud orchestration frameworks has emerged over the past few years. These orchestration frameworks enable the automated provisioning and decommissioning of cloud applications in a timely and efficient manner, but they offer limited or no support for application management. While management functionalities, such as configuring, monitoring and scaling single components, can be directly covered by cloud providers and configuration management tools, holistic management features, such as backing up, testing and updating multiple components, cannot be automated using these approaches. In this paper, we propose a concept to automatically generate executable holistic management workflows based on the TOSCA standard. The practical feasibility of the approach is validated through a prototype implementation and a case study.

Land subsidence due to underground resources exploitation is a well-known problem that affects many cities in the world, especially the ones located along the coastal areas where the combined effect of subsidence and sea level rise increases the flooding risk. In this study, 25 years of land subsidence affecting the Municipality of Ravenna (Italy) are monitored using Advanced Differential Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (A-DInSAR) techniques. In particular, the exploitation of the new Sentinel-1A SAR data allowed us to extend the monitoring period till 2016, giving a better understanding of the temporal evolution of the phenomenon in the area. Two statistical approaches are applied to fully exploit the informative potential of the A-DInSAR results in a fast and systematic way. Thanks to the applied analyses, we described the behavior of the subsidence during the monitored period along with the relationship between the occurrence of the displacement and its main driving factors.

The widespread availability of IoT technologies allows, among others, detailed monitoring of environmental parameters that can be used for effective prevention and forecasts of natural disasters. When such events occur, or are about to occur, the primary concern of authorities responsible for the public safety is to organise and enforce the relief in an as quick as possible and effective way. However, the huge amount of information that an IoT infrastructure is able to provide is useless if not correlated and contextualised on the territory where the hazard has occurred. In this paper the authors present the design of a semantic information model which integrates different information domains into a unified framework. In particular, some ontologies have been defined to represent, respectively, the information domain of hazards, the domain of sensors (which are responsible for measuring the phenomena that may trigger hazards), the geographic domain and the environmental risk domain, also including the potential damage and dangerousness of such events. In the proposed semantic framework, a place (be it a single building or an entire region) can be characterised from the environmental risk point of view. The resulting knowledge base can then be used to build monitoring services capable of identifying on the territory those sensing units whose sensed data are really useful for the setup of a relief plan. A prototype of such a monitoring tool was also implemented. Finally, two simple yet complete use case examples focusing on the wildfire hazard and on the flood risk respectively are discussed in the paper.

Objective Operative repair for anomalous aortic origin of a coronary artery (AAOCA) has been described using various innovative techniques. Common to each series is the use of a full sternotomy. As demand for minimally invasive approaches to adult cardiac surgery has increased, the upper hemisternotomy has emerged as a safe and effective technique for aortic valve and root replacement. This report reviews our results and describes the application of an upper hemisternotomy to an algorithm-based surgical approach for AAOCA.Methods From January 2012 to March 2013, the aortic root was approached via a 7-cm skin incision and upper hemisternotomy for all patients undergoing repair of an AAOCA. The type of repair performed was in accordance with a predefined surgical algorithm. The anomalous vessel had a slit-like ostium and followed a supracom-missural intramural course in three patients with symptomatic anomalous right coronary artery. These patients underwent coronary unroofing. In contrast, a patient with an anomalous left coronary artery presented without an intramural segment and underwent vessel translocation and reimplantation.Results All patients underwent AAOCA repair according to our surgical algorithm and via an upper hemisternotomy. The median length of stay was 4 days. All patients had resolution of symptoms, and there were no reported complications at a median follow-up of 16.5 months.Conclusions This series describes a minimally invasive approach to AAOCA repair. When used in conjunction with a defined surgical algorithm, this technique enables a safe and effective repair in all forms of AAOCA without concomitant coronary artery disease.

Renal cell carcinoma is occasionally complicated by the formation of a neoplastic thrombus invading the inferior vena cava. Rarely, the thrombus extends into the vena cava, reaching the right atrium. In these situations, despite the advanced tumor stage, surgical resection continues to offer the best chance for effective treatment. The operation requires a complex surgical approach with mobilization of the liver and use, in most cases, of extracorporeal circulation, which allows removal of the tumor thrombus from the right atrium. Traditionally, the intervention is performed using deep hypo-thermic circulatory arrest or, less frequently, using moderate hypothermia, aortic cross clamping, and cardioplegic cardiac arrest. These strategies have the downside of causing increased blood loss, coagulopathy, and long operative time and can potentially have a negative impact on survival. We report a different operative approach using normothermic cardiopulmonary bypass, with the expectation of lowering the rate of blood product transfusions, hospital length of stay, and overall incidence of complications.

The marbles exploited between Vitulano and Cautano (Benevento province, Campania region, Italy), have been widely utilized (at least from the 18th to the beginning of the 20th century) in several important monumental buildings of the region, due to their good properties and peculiar aesthetic qualities. They are limestones deriving from the filling of palaeo-cavities, carved into an emerged Cretaceous calcareous platform, by calcareous breccias, bauxite and alabastrine deposits. Such cavities are the result of both jointing and karst processes. The studied outcrops of the Vitulano Marbles are affected by a complex joint pattern in terms of attitude and spacing, which results in rock blocks highly variable in volume. Regarding the mineralogical composition, calcite is definitely predominant whereas the insoluble residue is constituted by low amounts of dolomite, bohemite, ematite and kaolinite. The petrophysical characterization put in evidence fairly good geomechanical properties, only partly affected by the geostructural anisotropy of the rock.

Abstract: Results of a research carried out on the lavas from Campi Flegrei and Somma-Vesuvius volcanic districts are reported here. The lavas have been widely employed, since Roman age, in several important monumental buildings of the Campania region, mainly in the town of Naples and in its province. They are classified as trachytes (Campi Flegrei products), tephri-phonolites and phono-tephrites (Somma-Vesuvius complex) from a petrographical point of view. Sampling was carried out from well-known exploitation districts. A substantial chemical difference between the products of the two sectors was confirmed, while petrophysical characterization evidenced similarity among the two different materials, although some differences were recorded even in samples coming from the same exploitation site.

The present paper focuses on the geomorphological evolution of the central sector of Ilice Torrent basin, Italy, where deeply weathered crystalline rocks are present. Based on archival research, multitemporal air photo analysis, and geomorphological surveys, the study gives new insights into an area extensively affected by mass movements. The Santo Miele complex landslide is the main landform in the area. In 1996 it underwent a phase of reactivation, which in turn caused serious damage to public infrastructure and private properties. Based on analysis of the study area during the period 1955-2004, five geomorphological maps were produced, integrated by field surveys conducted between 2005 and 2006. Since 1955 several landslides have been recognized, with a relevant increase in the areal extent of unstable areas in 1979. Slope instability has been documented since at least the 16th century, when the Santo Miele landslide was already active.

The basin of the Alaco River, in the Serre Massif of Calabria (Italy), is characterized by outcropping Palaeozoic granitoid rocks. The complex neotectonic history of the area and adverse climatic conditions, both active at least since the Quaternary, resulted in deep weathering of the crystalline rocks. Field observations, integrated with laboratory and in situ tests, allowed the weathering profile to be defined following the six-fold scheme proposed by the Hong Kong Geotechnical Control Office. The weathered rocks evidence a wide variety of mass movements, which were mapped over the entire basin. Debris flow-type instabilities dominate in the residual and saprolitic soils, while falls and slides are more significant in the less weathered rocks. In view of the complex vertical and lateral weathering in the rock mass and the high to very high overall susceptibility of the outcropping rocks to landsliding, it is difficult to postulate any direct relationships between individual types of mass movement and weathering grade.

Aortic root reconstruction is a demanding surgical procedure still associated with a significant morbidity. Arguably, the most demanding aspect of the operation is reestablishing continuity between the prosthetic graft replacing the aortic root and the coronary arteries. With the objective of simplifying the possible challenges of coronary reimplantation, we designed a new model of aortic root graft with prefabricated coronary branches. We used this technique in 8 patients (6 males, 2 females; mean age, 54 years). There were 6 modified Bentall procedures and 2 valve-sparing root replacements with the “reimplantation” technique. There was no mortality or morbidity related to the use of this new prosthetic graft. Our purpose was to report in detail the technique of aortic root reconstruction using this new graft with prefabricated coronary branches. The use of this graft may simplify the procedure and offer a valuable tool for aortic root reconstruction in cases where the reimplantation of the coronary buttons may represent a technical challenge.

Endovascular stent grafting has emerged as an effective method for the treatment of complicated acute type B aortic dissections. In cases where access to the aorta cannot be established through the ileofemoral trunks, the axillary arteries are used as an alternative route. Often, however, these arteries are too small to accommodate the device sheath. We report the case of an 82-year-old female with complicated type B aortic dissection treated with deployment of an endovascular stent-graft through an 8 mm Dacron graft sewn to the innominate artery.

Antithrombin is a potent inhibitor of the coagulation cascade exerting its primary effects on activated factors X, IX and II. It is the mechanism by which heparin and low-molecular weight heparin cause anti-coagulation. Deficiency of Antithrombin presents as a hypercoagulable state, and may result in unexplained deep venous thrombosis, arterial thrombosis and systemic embolization.

The article presents a case of papillary aortic fibroelastoma in a female with a history of tobacco use, hypertension and diabetes. Transthoracic echocardiogram (TTE) reveals the patient with ischemic stroke and an infarct pattern highly suggestive of embolic mechanism. Further study is recommended on TTE in cases where there is high possibility of embolism despite negative.