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Agriculture is responsible for up to 30% of the greenhouse gases emission, and cattle breeding is the main contributor making up almost 10% of the total. For this reason, this sector is a key player toward a complete decarbonization. To take the proper action to reduce climate impact of cattle breeding, it is necessary to know the energy requirements of the industry. This work focuses on the energy mapping of a parmesan cheese production, with reference to an agricultural company situated in Modena province with about six hundred animals. Knowing the electrical and thermal energy requirements to produce a wheel of cheese gives the possibility to the farmers to identify and reduce the energy wastage as well as starting the implementation of a strategy for fossil fuel substitution. In this study, a comprehensive monitoring campaign is presented together with the proposal of some possible improvements. The analysis showed that, considering the actual situation, about 64 kWh of electrical energy and 94 kWh of thermal energy are needed to produce a parmesan cheese wheel, while the fuel used to feed the agricultural machinery (e.g., tractors) accounts for around 174 kWh. In this context, the implementation of biogas and solar photovoltaic can greatly contribute to reduce the dependence on fossil fuels.

Introduction Placenta accreta spectrum (PAS) is a rare but potentially life-threatening event due to massive hemorrhage. Placenta previa and previous cesarean section are major risk factors for PAS. Italy holds one of the highest rates of primary and repeated cesarean section in Europe; nonetheless, there is a paucity of high-quality Italian data on PAS. The aim of this paper was to estimate the prevalence of PAS in Italy and to evaluate its associated factors, ante- and intra-partum management, and perinatal outcomes. Also, since severe morbidity and mortality in Italy show a North-South gradient, we assessed and compared perinatal outcomes of women with PAS according to the geographical area of delivery. Material and methods This was a prospective population-based study using the Italian Obstetric Surveillance System (ItOSS) and including all women aged 15–50 years with a diagnosis of PAS between September 2014 and August 2016. Six Italian regions were involved in the study project, covering 49% of the national births. Cases were prospectively reported by a trained clinician for each participating maternity unit by electronic data collection forms. The background population comprised all women who delivered in the participating regions during the study period. Results A cohort of 384 women with PAS was identified from a source population of 458 995 maternities for a prevalence of 0.84/1000 (95% CI, 0.75–0.92). Antenatal suspicion was present in 50% of patients, who showed reduced rates of blood transfusion compared to unsuspected patients (65.6% versus 79.7%, P = 0.003). Analyses by geographical area showed higher rates of both concomitant placenta previa and prior CS (62.1% vs 28.7%, PPPP = 0.001), and severe maternal morbidity (5.0% vs 11.1%, P = 0.036). Delivery in a referral center for PAS occurred in 71.9% of these patients. Conclusions Antenatal suspicion of PAS is associated with improved maternal outcomes, also among high-risk women with both placenta previa and prior CS, likely because of their referral to specialized centers for PAS management.

To evaluate the proportion of neonatal intensive care units with facilities supporting parental presence in their infants' rooms throughout the 24-hour day (ie, infant-parent rooms) in high-income countries and to analyze the association of this with outcomes of extremely preterm infants.

The aim of this work is modeling a gasification process where a non-conventional biomass is used as fuel: hemp hurd residues. An equilibrium model of the gasification reaction was implemented in the PhytonTM software environment. Syngas composition, syngas higher heating value, tar production and gasification cold gas efficiency were evaluated at different value of biomass moisture starting from biomass ultimate analysis and reaction equivalence ratio (ER) value. The model is able to predict char and tar production as function of biomass composition, moisture and ER. A comparison with experimental data obtained from hemp hurd gasification was done to validate equilibrium model results. Gasification tests were performed using a low capacity lab-scale gasification reactor designed to use about 1 kg per hour of dry biomass fuel. Results show small errors between model results and experimental result. Several simulations were performed to assess the gasification dependency on selected boundary conditions like biomass moisture and ER of the gasifier., Proceedings of the 28th European Biomass Conference and Exhibition, 6-9 July 2020, Virtual, pp. 450-454

Portable petrol powered generator are very popular around the world. They are used mostly when electrical power from the grid is not available, for example in blackout scenarios, remote areas or for temporary use and they are basically irreplaceable in many cases. The idea behind this work is to substitute the fossil fuel as the energy source of these systems with the syngas produced through biomass gasification, that is a carbon negative energy process in order to achieve a complete decarbonisation as soon as possible. Coupling gasifiers and reciprocating internal combustion engine is a very old technology, however there are no small and cheap systems available that can be successfully connected to this kind of generator. The laboratory scale gasifier presented in Lisbon at the 27th EUBCE in the paper titled: “Design and first tests of a micro lab scale (2kg/h) gasifier” after a series of test has been improved enhancing its efficiency, gas quality and power output. A GeoTech GGP 4000 ES petrol powered has been selected to operate with the syngas from the gasification system and its intake manifold has been modified. The gasifier is able to operate with different kinds of biomasses like wood fir pellets, wood chips, vine prunings pellets, hemp hurd etc. The fuel chosen for the test was the standard A1 ENPlus wood pellet. An Iveco air filter was used to preserve the engine from the tars and particulate present in the gas. The energetic consumption was calculated and the thermal power output from the engine exhaust was estimated measuring gas composition and the air flow and entering in the gasifier. The results from the test show that it is possible renew the way the portable petrol generator are used, making them efficient and eco-friendly without increasing dramatically the complexity of the system or the costs., Proceedings of the 28th European Biomass Conference and Exhibition, 6-9 July 2020, Virtual, pp. 396-400

Vine prunings are a very abundant by product of the wine industry and their production can be estimated to be between 1 to 5 ton/year for every hectare. In the view of a decarbonisation and the development of the circular economy this biomass should become an opportunity even if in most of the cases it ends up being a problem. This is due to their common burning in situ that has a huge environmental impact, and to their shredding when left on the field that can be an infection source in presence of grape diseases. This work follows the one presented the 26th EUBCE “Gasification and wine industry: report on the use vine pruning as fuel in small – scale gasifiers” where it was evaluated the possibility of producing electrical energy using this biomass as fuel in APL PP20 gasifier – engine system. The results of the previous work showed quite promising results about the gasification efficiency and the quality of the gas produced using this biomass, however the difficulties encountered during the reactor feeding and the bridging problems have made this process quite challenging. In order to overcome these issues, it was considered the possibility of pelletizing this biomass. More than 2.5 ton of pelletizing vine prunings were successfully gasified with a quite high efficiency, 1.1 kg consumed for every electric kWh produced. The 150 kg of biochar produced through the process were tested on a vineyard as soil improver. The entire supply chain, from the harvesting of the vine prunings on the field, to the pelletization and gasification, was economically evaluated considering different possible scenarios and some of them were quite profitable and therefore practically feasible., Proceedings of the 28th European Biomass Conference and Exhibition, 6-9 July 2020, Virtual, pp. 92-96

Most of the gasification systems cost various tens or hundreds of thousands of euros, take up a lot of space and need trained staff to be operated. This implies that biomass gasification tests are usually expensive and complex to carry out. From all these difficulties arise the need of a solution that is simple, cheap and small, allowing experimental studies without all the issues related to a commercial power plant. A laboratory scale gasifier was designed and built to meet this need. The main features of the system are the use of stainless steel for all the parts, the small size that allows to use it on a worktable and the nominal biomass flow rate of 2 kg/h. Data from literature was used to size the gasifier and choose its main parameters after an interpolation process. The interpolation was necessary because most of the data available refers to systems at least one order of magnitude more powerful than this prototype. Fir wood pellet was tested as a benchmark of the gasification system. Thanks to the manageability of the system it will allow to test different kinds of biomass. Gas - chromatographic analyses and tar and particulate sampling were carried out in order to evaluate the gas produced by the system. Elemental analysis of the char extracted from the lower part of the gasifier was performed to assess its quality. First results showed that the composition and the amount of contaminant of the gas are similar to the ones produced in much bigger power plant and also the char composition is the typical one for pyrogasification., Proceedings of the 27th European Biomass Conference and Exhibition, 27-30 May 2019, Lisbon, Portugal, pp. 797-801

Electronically controlled throttle valves are often used in syngas fueled engines in order to maintain the engine speed constant under variable load and gas composition conditions. The producer gas carries two macro-categories of pollutants: tars (naphthalene, benzene, toluene etc. in vapor phase) and particulate matter; a high concentration of these species leads, almost certainly, to governor stuck or failure. These malfunctions force to engine shutdown. Since it is not always possible to move towards to a better syngas filtration, especially on small scale systems, it is fundamental to investigate the way of fouling of this device. This preliminary study lead to the conclusion that a combined CFD and psychrometric approach is required for a better comprehension of the fouling phenomena., Proceedings of the 25th European Biomass Conference and Exhibition, 12-15 June 2017, Stockholm, Sweden, pp. 738-742

This paper exposes the first year of activities regarding an Italian regional project called REBAF (RecuperoEnergeticoBiomasse Alvei Fluviali = Energetic Recover of River Biomasses). The project concerns the modeling, realization and experimental validation of innovative pathways for the exploitation of grass and woodsy biomasses from river maintenance operations. The project is focused on the Secchia river situated in the mid North of Italy. The final goal is to make the river maintenance operations self-sustainability from the economic and environmental point of views. During the first year of the project, the typical biomasses of the Secchia river was recognized and quantified. Poplar was chosen as major representative of the wood biomasses. An evaluation about wood biomass quantity obtainable for every hectare of riverbanks maintenance was made. Several gasification tests of poplar wood chips from river maintenance was done in a small CHP gasifier. The biochar obtained was characterized and it was applied on field to some giant reed plantations in order to evaluate if there will be a productivity increase with biochar as soil amendant. In addition, a model to evaluate the giant reed annual productivity in the Secchia river banks was developed., Proceedings of the 25th European Biomass Conference and Exhibition, 12-15 June 2017, Stockholm, Sweden, pp. 52-57

Primary hyperoxaluria type-1 (PH1) is a rare inherited autosomal recessive disorder in which a deficiency of the hepatic enzyme alanine-glyoxylate aminotransferase leads to endogenous oxalate overproduction, renal failure, systemic oxalate deposition and death. As hemodialysis provides insufficient oxalate clearance, patients ultimately require both liver and kidney transplantation for correction of the metabolic abnormality and oxalate excretion. Herein, we describe a young adult male with end-stage renal disease and systemic oxalosis causing progressive disabling multi-organ dysfunction while awaiting transplantation. We review the literature regarding liver-kidney transplantation and suggest that for patients with PH1, a standardized assessment of organ dysfunction and functional impairment may improve identification of patients requiring urgent transplantation thereby reducing the morbidity and mortality that can occur with delayed transplantation.

Understanding the relationship between physical exercise, reactive oxygen species (ROS) and skeletal muscle modification is important in order to better identify the benefits or the damages that appropriate or inappropriate exercise can induce. Unbalanced ROS levels can lead to oxidation of cellular macromolecules a major class of protein oxidative modification is carbonylation. The aim of this investigation was to study muscle protein expression and carbonylation patterns in trained and untrained animal models. We analyzed two muscles characterized by different metabolisms: tibialis anterior and soleus. Whilst tibialis anterior is mostly composed of fast-twitch fibers, the soleus muscle is mostly composed of slow-twitch fibers. By a proteomic approach we identified 15 protein spots whose expression is influenced by training. Among them, in tibalis anterior we observed a down-regulation of several glycolitic enzymes. Concerning carbonylation, we observed the existence of a high basal level of protein carbonylation. Although this level shows some variation among individual animals, several proteins (mostly involved in energy metabolism, muscle contraction, and stress response) appear carbonylated in all animals and in both types of skeletal muscle. Moreover we identified 13 spots whose carbonylation increases after training. The increased carbonylation level may be correlated with the reduced CAT and SOD1 enzymes activity in both skeletal muscles. An important challenge for future investigation in this field will be to understand the impact of carbonylation on specific proteins and to evaluate whether and in which circumstances this basal level, which is supposedly well tolerated by cells, may increase as to hamper their functions.

The classical approach to syngas processing is based on the assumption that the gas stream (composed of H2, CO2, CO, N2, CH4 and H2O) carries tars ashes and soot in it. Tars are usually classified as liquid, while the soot and the ashes are evidently considered solid. This approach is undoubtedly valid but needs to be adapted depending on the temperature conditions that continuously change in a typical gasification power plant composed of a reactor, a filtering system and an engine. Particular attention is payed in this work to the water vapor. It is an unavoidable product of the gasification process that origins from the combustion reactions or derives from the biomass moisture. Under the dew point this vapor condensates assisted by the soot and ashes that can act as nuclei for droplets coalescence. The work proposed here uses achemical equilibrium model for the evaluation of the gas composition varying the biomass moisture content, then the model output is analyzed using the approach typical of psychrometric problems. In this way it was possible to spotlight the limit temperature in the gas line that avoids water condensation. In fact, the temperature cannot be simply increased because, even if this solution prevent condensation, it drastically reduces the engine performance ad even its durability. For this reason, this study takes into account the equations that simplify the engine behavior and, nevertheless, allow us to evaluate the ultimate performance variation produced by the temperature limit imposed by the moisture content in the biomass., Proceedings of the 23rd European Biomass Conference and Exhibition, 1-4 June 2015, Vienna, Austria, pp. 774-779