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Comprendere il comportamento, l'evoluzione e le caratteristiche del mare è una questione essenziale per affrontare alcune grandi sfide attuali in materia di ambiente: il cambiamento climatico, il ciclo del carbonio, l'acidificazione degli oceani, le variazioni della circolazione marina e i loro effetti, ecc. Per questo, il numero di studi sul mare è in aumento da alcuni anni a questa parte. La temperatura del sistema-mare è esplicitamente menzionata nell'allegato III della Marine Strategy Framework Directive (2008) come uno dei parametri che richiedono maggiore attenzione. Le misurazioni significative e coerenti della temperatura dell'acqua di mare sono essenziali per comprendere la sua influenza in quasi tutti i processi marini, nonché per comprendere i meccanismi di scambio di calore tra il mare e l'atmosfera.

A new high-resolution pollen record, spanning the last five millennia, is presented from the Gulf of Gaeta (Tyrrhenian Sea, central Italy), with the aim of verifying if any vegetation change occurred in the central Mediterranean region in relation to specific well-known global and/or regional climate events, including the 4.2 ka event, the Medieval Climate Anomaly (MCA) and the Little Ice Age (LIA), and to detect possible vegetation changes related to still under-investigated climate signals, for example the so-called “Bond 2” cold event around 2.8 ka BP. The vegetation dynamics of the Gaeta record shows a recurrent pattern of forest increase and decline punctuating the mid- and late Holocene. When the timing of these patterns is compared with the climate proxy data available from the same core (planktonic foraminifera assemblages and oxygen stable isotope record) and with the NAO (North Atlantic Oscillation) index, it clearly appears that the main driver for the forest fluctuations is climate, which may even overshadow the effects of human activity. We have found a clear correspondence between phases with negative NAO index and forest declines. In particular, around 4200 cal BP, a drop in AP (Arboreal Pollen) confirms the clearance recorded in many sites in Italy south of 43°N. Around 2800 cal BP, a vegetation change towards open conditions is found at a time when the NAO index clearly shows negative values. Between 800 and 1000 AD, a remarkable forest decline, coeval with a decrease in the frequencies of both Castanea and Olea, matches a shift in the oxygen isotope record towards positive values, indicating cooler temperatures, and a negative NAO. Between 1400–1850 AD, in the time period chronologically corresponding to the LIA (Little Ice Age), the Gaeta record shows a clear decline of the forest cover, particularly evident after 1550 AD, once again in correspondence with negative NAO index. © 2017 Elsevier Ltd

During the past decades a number of sequence stratigraphy studies illustrated how, during Quaternary, interaction between sea level changes and sediment supply controlled the depositional evolution along continental margins, giving a cyclic signature to the sedimentary infilling. However, as both deposition and erosion are processes ultimately controlled by balance between environmental energy and sedimentary influx, also the oceanographic regime takes part in controlling the sedimentary growth along the continental margin. This is exactly what occurs on physiographic settings as islands offshore areas, where bottom currents can be very energetic. In the western Sicily offshore, southwards of Egadi Islands, the sea floor is characterized by depositional and erosional features formed under a variety of sedimentary processes and offers opportunity to investigate as sea level change and oceanographic regime combine each other to control depositional evolution. In this area, located along the clockwise flow of the Levantine Intermediate Water around the western Sicily margin, the sea floor morphology is very irregular as consequence of isolated reliefs and narrow submarine valleys, such as the Marettimo Valley which separates Favignana and Marettimo islands. We analysed and interpreted a grid of high-resolution (1 kJ Sparker) seismic reflection profiles integrated with multibeam bathy-morphologic data of selected areas; a 270 cm long gravity core has been also collected for sedimentology and biostratigraphy. The sedimentary succession accommodated along the eastern flank of the Marettimo Valley shows two different seismic units: unit A displays reflection-free seismic facies and thin, low- amplitude, inclined reflectors with downlap terminations onto the lower boundary, and erosional truncation at the upper boundary; these seismic facies are referable to oblique-tangential clinoforms and show a wedge-shaped external geometry. Unit B shows continuous, parallel, slightly concave reflectors and, towards the central sector of the Valley, continuous, sub-horizontal reflectors that form a deposit having a very broad low-mounded geometry; lateral transition in between concave and sub-horizontal reflectors is characterized by channelized erosional truncations. The two seismic units can be interpreted as the sedimentary response of different depositional processes: unit A accumulated by progradation of shallow-water deposits during eustatic forced-regression; unit B is referable to contourite drifts deposited by bottom currents through the Marettimo Valley. This unusual interbedding of very shallow water contouritic and shelf margin deposits derives from enhanced sedimentary dynamics during sea-level fall and lowstand stages when, as consequence of decreased water depth of the Marettimo Valley, bottom currents accelerated scouring channelized erosional surfaces; in the same time, deposition of forced regression across the shelf margin buried contourite drifts.

An integrated marine geophysics and satellite remote sensing study of Naples Bay (Italy) has been carried out to evaluate the presence, magnitude, areal extent and activity of the Naples Active Deformation Line (NADEL), a structural bend affecting the post Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) sedimentary sequences. Sparker high-resolution mono-channel profiles and multibeam swath bathymetric data were acquired during the SAFE-2014 research cruise, carried out on board of the Urania R/V of CNR on August 2014. The marine geophysical study was integrated with the ground deformation field of the emerged sectors of the study area (Sorrento Peninsula and Campi Flegrei), derived by Synthetic Aperture Radar interferometry (InSAR) data, referred to the 1993-2000 and 2003-2010 time periods. The InSAR data obtained from the ERS, RADARSAT and ENVISAT images were processed with the method of Permanent Scatterers (PS). Marine geophysical data provide evidence of morphological and stratigraphic features extending for about 18 km along a N130E strike. The NADEL deformation bend divides a NE offshore area, characterized by a flat morphology (slope< 1°, on average) from a SW sector, where the slope at >180 m below the sea level is, on average, 1.5°). In the area located SW of NADEL, the slopes are morphologically characterized by the presence of the uppermost active branches of the Magnaghi canyon, which are bounded upward by the presence of the NADEL pattern. Thus, we suppose that the emplacement of the Magnaghi branches and NADEL are linked. InSAR data show that a similar deformation pattern can be detected also inland, in the distal sectors located NW and SE from the NADEL edges. The NADEL segments also affect the distal SW sector of the Campi Flegrei active caldera and the carbonate units cropping out in the Sorrento Peninsula, thus extending in length for more than 40 km.

We present a high-resolution paleoclimatic reconstruction of the last four millennia from a shallow water marine record recovered in the central Tyrrhenian Sea (Gulf of Gaeta) based on planktonic foraminifera and pollen records combined with oxygen stable isotope, tephrostratigraphic and magnetostratigraphic analysis. Paleoclimatic events have been recognised and discussed within the following time in intervals: Eneolithic (base of the core- ca. 2410 BC), Early Bronze Age (ca. 2410 BC - ca. 1900 BC), Middle Bronze Age - Iron Age (ca. 1900 BC - ca. 500 BC), Roman Period (ca. 500 BC - ca. 550 AD), Dark Age (ca. 550 AD - ca. 860 AD), Medieval Climate Anomaly (ca. 860 AD - ca. 1250 AD), Little Ice Age (ca. 1250 AD - ca. 1850 AD), Industrial Period (ca. 1850 AD - ca. 1950 AD), Modern Warm Period (ca. 1950 AD - present day). Within these time intervals, the proxy records document short-term climate oscillations well correlated with other records from Mediterranean marine areas (Alboran Sea, Gulf of Taranto, Adriatic Sea, and Ionian Sea). The long term trend in oxygen isotopic record obtained from the planktonic foraminiferal species Globigerinoides ruber (?18OG.ruber) has an antithetic correlation with the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) suggesting a strong northern hemisphere influence on the climate variability of the central Mediterranean region. The long term trend and amplitude oscillations of the ?18OG.ruber signal, the onset of main planktonic foraminiferal turnover from carnivorous to herbivorous-opportunistic species, and the consistent fluctuations of the pollen records document an important modification in climate system from the onset of the Roman Period up to the present-day. In addition, from ca. 500 AD upwards, the planktonic foraminiferal ?18O data, from marine records, shows a synchronous progressive long-term shift to more positive values superimposed to short-term oscillation, suggesting a Mediterranean secular scale signature in isotopic composition. From Maunder event to present day there is a progressive inversion in ?18O composition, suggesting the onset of the modern warm climate condition.

The 5 km wide Banco della Montagna (BdM) morphological high is located on the seafloor of Naples Bay (Tyrrhenian Sea, Italy) and is characterized by a hummocky surface. Oceanographic surveys revealed active fluid vents at BdM. High-resolution mono-channel seismic and multibeam bathymetry allow us to define the detailed morphology and the inner geometry of BdM, which consists of a complex set of dome-like structures (pagodas) affecting the present-day seabed. We suggest that a gas-water-sand sediment mixture upraises from a gas saturated layer pushing up the overlying marine deposits and forming mounds, folds, and faults. According to a thin-plate elastic model, we estimate the fluid (gas) pressure Pdef required to form BdM and obtain Pdef = 0.3 Pa, a value consistent with that for doming processes in gas-hydrate settings. At BdM, the pressure ?P required to break the seabed is in the order of 2-3 MPa, while the gas column height is about 240 m.

The retrieval of series of proxy data on the past climate will serve to acquire a deeper understanding of the climate system and a more accurate prediction of its future development, as a priority task for the scientific community. In particular, the analysis of climate data of the past is an essential tool for studying the dynamics of the earth's climatic system in conditions different from present ones, and irreplaceable for testing the validity of medium- and long-term forecasting models. The determination of the influence of anthropogenic impacts on the planet’s environment is predicated on a clear understanding of the natural ways in which the earth's climate responds to the complex set of external forcings. Therefore, in recent decades, many national and international research groups have focused attention on the study of the climate evolution in late-Quaternary sediments from the Mediterranean area. By virtue of its close relationship with continental masses subject to different climatic processes, the Mediterranean basin permits the documentation of climate evolution both globally and in the Northern Hemisphere. Finally, it is worth noting that shallow sea (continental shelf) areas are natural repositories for the monitoring of short-term climate change and anthropogenic impacts on the marine system. To make available information on climate history and environment yielded by marine sediments, this WP will be dedicated to analyzing and, where possible, collecting cores of marine sediments, especially those drilled in shallow sea environments, and focusing on climate dynamics in the Mediterranean over past centuries. During its course, the project will analyse and, where possible, sample marine sediment cores in continental shelf environments and in different sectors of the Mediterranean basin. Previous studies have indicated them as key sites for the identification of major short-term climate fluctuations, due to global and local forces active during the Quaternary and particularly in the past thousand years. In fact, the possibility of enriching the databases referring to this time interval (to date, still limited to the Mediterranean) will provide new working hypotheses for the implementation of numerical models that attempt simulate how the Mediterranean, in particular the marine-coastal sector, has responded to past climate dynamics (Medieval Warm Period / Little Ice Age transition, Little Ice Age, the Industrial Age, and Modern Warming). The cores obtained will be the focus of multidisciplinary studies involving national and international research groups.

Una prima descrizione dei fattori di rischio causa di malattia nei contadini fu fatta da Bernardino Ramazzini nel De morbis artificum diatriba (1713), riconoscendone fondamentalmente due, l’aria e la cattiva alimentazione; tali fattori, oltre a condizionare la comparsa di patologie, ne influenzavano la diversa risposta alle terapie mediche: egli consigliava, per esempio, di “non prelevare loro sangue in abbondanza come si fa invece nella gente di città”. Dopo circa due secoli, il mondo rurale diventa oggetto d’interesse scientifico per la peculiarità delle cause ambientali, biologiche e fisiopatologiche alla base dei processi morbosi, che, nonostante il passare dei secoli, restano gli stessi indicati da Ramazzini. Tuttavia, per il ritardato sviluppo del mondo rurale, riconducibile in parte a ragioni storiche, ma in parte anche ad un mancato coordinamento tra interventi di bonifica ambientale, sanitaria e tecnologica, ancora nel 1932, come affermò al congresso di Medicina del Lavoro di quell’anno Pellegrini, riprendendo un’affermazione di Castellino, il rurale restava un grande sconosciuto, mentre al XIX congresso del 1953, col contributo fondamentale dell’INAIL, si cercava ancora di fotografare un mondo nel quale le auspicate bonifiche socio-sanitarie non erano state sostanzialmente applicate. In effetti, pur essendo stata l’Italia ad economia in prevalenza agricola fino agli anni ’60, poche ricerche mediche e sociali avevano affrontato sistematicamente il problema del rapporto tra lavoro agricolo e insorgenza di malattia. Anche per tale motivo, nel corso del ‘900 i lavoratori dell’agricoltura ottennero le tutele assicurative su malattia, infortunio. vecchiaia e invalidità, rispetto alla classe operaia dell’industria, con notevole ritardo e sempre con qualche limitazione. Il sostanziale disinteresse pubblico, legislativo e scientifico per la sicurezza e tutela della salute degli agricoltori era dovuto, e in parte è ancora dovuto, alla tipologia organizzativa del lavoro agricolo, basata prevalentemente sulla conduzione familiare, o sul lavoro non strutturato di dipendenza, quale il cottimo, la mezzadria, o il lavoro stagionale. Giuridicamente tali attività hanno sempre ostacolato l’applicazione degli obblighi di prevenzione e tutela a carico di datori di lavoro e in favore dei prestatori d’opera agricola: zappatori, mungitori e raccoglitori, presi a mo’ d’esempio di mansioni lavorative rurali, hanno dovuto assicurarsi da loro stessi il minimo di prevenzione dai rischi della vita, rimanendo in pratica esclusi da diritti che all’oggi sembrano scontati, quali quelli ad una dignitosa salute fisica e sociale e ad un lavoro esente da pericoli. La Medicina del Lavoro, nata come disciplina autonoma nel corso del secolo scorso proprio per contribuire allo studio del rapporto fra malattie e lavoro, ha risentito di tale disinteresse, dedicando e sviluppando pochi studi e ricerche per la conoscenza dei fattori di rischio in agricoltura rispetto a quelli d’altri comparti lavorativi. Già Ramazzini nel De morbis su 55 trattazioni di malattie in lavoratori, riassume in un solo capitolo quelle dei contadini, pur essendo l’umanità alla sua epoca quasi tutta dedita ai lavori agricoli. Così nel ‘900, al primo congresso italiano di Medicina del Lavoro (1907, Palermo) non si discusse di medicina rurale: eppure essa rappresentava la gran parte dell’emergenza sanitaria dell’epoca non solamente come effetto d’esposizione a rischio lavorativo, ma anche di ordine sociale e ‘geografico’, vedi la piaga della malaria e dell’anchilostomiasi, che hanno condizionato demograficamente e socialmente larghe fette del territorio nazionale. La scuola medica napoletana da Ferrannini a Castellino e Caccuri ha dato contributi occasionali, limitati ad una generica analisi descrittiva del multiforme mondo della ruralità, senza approfondimento epidemiologico dei fattori di rischio, tipologia di lavoro ed insorgenza di patologie nei lavoratori agricoli della Campania. Pertanto, anche nel Congresso internazionale di Medicina del Lavoro tenuto a Napoli nel 1954, il tema fu del tutto trascurato: ancora nel 1960 S. Caccuri riassumeva in suo scritto la patologia dei rurali senza apporti nuovi di conoscenza. Nel frattempo, il problema, e l’interesse scientifico per esso, si esauriva da sé, con qualche ritardo nel Meridione ma inesorabile, con l’industrializzazione, l’urbanizzazione e i conseguenti spopolamento e abbandono di quel mondo rurale, che rimase, pertanto, per sempre ‘sconosciuto’.

Il gruppo di geofisica dell'Istituto per l'Ambiente Marino Costiero del Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche (CNR-IAMC) di Napoli, coordinato dal dott. Vincenzo Di Fiore, ha condotto nelle aree di piana costiera di Sibari (Cs) un'indagine di tipo geoelettrico, per la ricostruzione tri-dimensionale dei corpi idrici presenti e finalizzata all'identificazione di possibili fenomeni di ingressione marina. Tale acquisizione si inserisce come indagine preliminare alla definizione di un sistema di monitoraggio per la valutazione dell'intrusione nelle falde acquifere di componenti idrosaline provenienti dalle vicine aree costiere. Il team ha eseguito le operazioni di acquisizione di 8 profili in un'area in sinistra idrografica della confluenza tra i fiumi Coscile e Crati, tra le località "Lattughelle" e il sito "Casabianca" compreso nel Parco archeologico del Cavallo, per un totale di 5440 m. Le elaborazioni dei risultati delle tomografie di Resistività Elettrica (ERT) ad alta risoluzione consentiranno di riconoscere le caratteristiche elettriche e le geometrie dei corpi presenti nel sottosuolo di questo tratto della piana costiera di Sibari.

Biotic, petrophysical, paleomagnetic proxies combined with 14C AMS data allowed us to produce, for deep marine record of Sentinelle Valley (Sardinia Channel), a detailed integrated stratigraphic time-framework for the last 80 kyr. Major planktonic foraminiferal changes in quantitative distribution of selected climate sensitive species allowed the identification of 10 eco-biozones and the main climatic global events (Sapropel S1, Younger Dryas, Greenland Isotope Interstadial 1, Greenland Isotope Stadial 2, Heinrich events H1-H6). An accurate age-depth profile has been proposed for the studied record which spans between 2 and 83 kyr cal. BP. The adopted age model was successively confirmed by comparing the colour reflectance data of the studied record with the astronomically tuned deep marine record ODP-Site 964 from the Ionian Sea. Three turbidite event layers were chronologically constrained within the relative low stand and lowering sea level phases associated to the MIS 4 and MIS 3.

Benthic foraminifera in 250 samples collected on the Southern Campanian continental shelf were analysed. Q-mode cluster analysis resulted in the identification of six distinct foraminiferal assemblages, reflecting different environmental settings. The distribution of the assemblages shows a distinct zonation, that is manly attributed to grainsize and composition of sediment, bathymetry and to geographical distribution of the impact of the river supply. Cluster I (4-20 m), is related to the areas influenced by the rivers outflow on sandy-silt and very sandy silt substrates, dominated by the species Ammonia beccarii and Eggerella scabra; cluster II (10-30 m), associated with vegetated environments and/or sandy and gravelly sandy substrates, presents a characteristic epiphytic fauna composed by Cibicides lobatulus, Rosalina bradyi and Rosalina obtusa; cluster III (10-50 m) shows a typical infralittoral assemblage mainly related to sandy silty and very sandy silty substrates, not directly affected by the rivers outflow, with the dominance of Ammonia tepida and Elphidium granosum; cluster IV related to silty sandy substrates of the Sorrento Peninsula shelf, is chracterised by Elphidium crispum and Cibicides lobatulus; cluster V (30-100 m) is composed by silty substrates with the dominance of the opportunistic species Valvulineria bradyana while cluster VI is characterized by an outer-shelf assemblage on silty bottoms, with prevalent Cassidulina carinata.

Climate has been acknowledged as one of the main driving factors behind human development and in turn human activity may cause strong changes on marine ecosystems. Coastal areas represent very useful marine sedimentary archives to investigate the potential effects of human impact on shelf marine ecosystems. The high-resolution investigation presented here of a southern Tyrrhenian marine record from the continental shelf of the Salerno Gulf provides an unprecedented opportunity to study the main natural and human impact that have occurred in this area during the last five centuries. Evidence of an important turnover between carnivorous and herbivorous opportunistic planktonic foraminfera species is recorded after the Maunder event. In addition, after 1940 AD, a strong increase in the distribution pattern of the Globigerina bulloides species combined with a sudden increase in the abundance pattern of the benthic foraminifer Bulimina aculeata, and evident enhancement of benthic and planktonic foraminifera (as number of specimens per gram of dry sediment) can be directly associated to the effects of the construction of the Sele River dam (1934 AD).